We Can (not) Contain
by reditlurker
Summary: The O-5's grand plan is interrupted by a containment breach of the highest severity and a buried weapon is unearthed to use against the monster. Meanwhile somebody on the inside has become dissatisfied with the O-5's new goals and works to bring them down and usher in a new age for humanity.
1. Chapter 1

**Site 81 2.5 miles underground**

The creature stirred, for the first time in a long time it had purpose. It had spent eons wandering this cursed planet, never a purpose, never a goal, and yet it endured the millenia. It's body never breaking, it's mind never faltering because deep in the back of it's highly intelligent mind it **knew** it had a purpose. Things like it didn't just come to be, it was far too perfect for dumb luck to determine its existence. A call had been sent out, not a command but a request, an impulse to go and destroy a city. It had been chosen as the vanguard, a role it was more than willing to oblige.

Ironic how at its lowest of lows, captured by the filthy creatures that saw themselves as gods and the world as theirs, that it would all become clear to it. At the same time though it made deliciously cruel sense, this was to be it's vengeance. It's mouth parting into a smile allowing scalding hydrochloric acid to pour into the back of it's throat.

The thing began to grow, the tungsten carbide restraints shattering into so many little pieces, the ceiling buckling outwards as klaxon alarms wailed just outside what had once been it's prison. The thing screamed in a sickening combination of pain and delight as burning napalm spilled onto its diamond hard hide in a futile attempt to contain it. How long had it been trapped down there, complacent in allowing them to run their tests, trying to kill it over and over again to no avail, 15 years, 20. What did it matter! This was it's vengeance! It would ensure the death of the species that had tried to play god and in return it would be allowed to ascend.

By now the thing had grown to over 60m and site MAGI had determined an impending XK class end of the world scenario with 95% certainty if it could not be stopped here.

The 3 minds reached an agreement, the 5 megaton N2 mine under the base would be armed and detonated. The collective minds enter the 24,000 digit code that would end the monster's existence only to realize that the warhead had been manually deactivated. It took the world's most advanced computational system exactly 1.3 seconds to come to the conclusion that this was more than a containment breach and was in fact a planned attack spearheaded at multiple angles. The sentient computer system's last act before being crushed by over 100,000 tons of muscle was sending this data packet to the overseer of the foundation's North American branch.

O5-4 pulled himself out of his bed at the sound of an incoming data packet. He pulled up his iris display intending to find out who sent the message at this hour and demote them to D class for ruining the sleep his cybernetics so rarely allowed him to get. "This had better be good" he growled under his breath his sunken eyes narrowed as they scrutinized the message, yellow irises growing smaller as his pupils followed the words.

-Site under attack-

-Keter class SCP breach detected XK class scenario imminent-

-N2 option manually disabled-

-Likelihood of foreign agents having infiltrated high level Foundation positions 99%-

-Primary threat SCP 682-

-May God have mercy-

O5-4 shuddered at that last line. It was almost impossible for MAGI to show emotion and when they did it almost always was before something horrific happened. The second impact came to mind. The MAGI's response to the conclusion of a contact experiment was simply...

-Please don't-

How bad would these next few months be? O5-4 was visibly shaking when he pushed the red button under his nightstand triggering a small computer to spring out of his desk. Sitting down at the keyboard and forcing the doubt out of his mind he replaced it with the steel he was known for and debated his next actions. There was only one thing on this planet that could could stop 682, but his associates would disapprove of its use. No matter, he would have to force their hand, nevertheless there would be no way to recall the failsafe once it was deployed. He input the command…

"Let man become god" as soon as the password had registered the failsafe would be activated and man would inevitably begin it's next step in evolution.

He realized that it would need to time to complete the startup sequence. Stepping out of bed and gazing out the full wall window at the perpetual Alaskan winter he pulled out his personal cell phone and dialed the 5th number in his contacts.

A wide grin spread across his face as he addressed his friend and rival. "Hello Mr. President, I have a problem that I believe would be mutually beneficial for both of us if it was solved as soon as possible."

 **Oval office, Anchorage, Alaska**

"What the hell do you mean 'Just turn them around'? Do you have any idea how important those guns are to the survival of this entire continent!"

"I am well aware Dave however…." O5-4 sniggered at the US president's sudden scream of shock. "Ah, just got the news I see."

"What the hell happened" came president David Emmons voice, suddenly deathly quiet.

"We had a breach at site 81."

"So how, if I may be so bold, is 1/16 of the second defensive line gone, including the mountain it was built on?" The president was grinding his teeth in anger now.

"This SCP was of… particular potency to begin with, we had it only just restrained and it would appear to have received a large sum of energy from some sort of outside force."

"So how do we stop it." The president growled.

"Rest assured, countermeasures are in place, however, if 682 is not delayed **now** then the failsafe will never be ready in time."

"FINE" roared David the control on his temper finally slipping, "but I swear to god if this results in a breach along the line, then I will personally rip your organization out of this country myself. Am I understood?"

"Crystal" O5-4 replied with exasperation.

 **Louisville-2 fortress city**

"Gentlemen, we just got a call from command, they got something really big and really nasty rampaging through the second line and they want us to kill it." The voice of Field Marshal Renaud said through the universal PA system. All across the Appalaches building sized guns came to life as eager battery managers filled their men in on what they were shooting at.

Inside the central superstructure the marshal waited as the building sized guns rotated 180* to face the inside of the country. "Load every 10th cannon with an N2 mine." his voice stretched across the command center.

"Marshal are you sure?" came the nervous reply of one of the bridge techs. Renaud nodded his understanding.

"Yes, the order came straight from the top, besides whatever that thing is it's in the middle of nowhere right now."

"Understood Sir!"

"Now," the Marshal's voice cracked like a whip, "fire." The roar of the guns was incomparable to any other sound on earth as over a thousand ten pound slugs poured out of the duel barreled guns at over the speed of sound.

In the span of under a second 9,000 pounds of tungsten and depleted uranium slammed into the monolithic body of SCP 682 who was now pushing the 100,000 ton mark and over a mile and a half tall. These shells which were designed to create a shockwave upon impact into the ground, did a truly massive amount of damage to the flesh. Breaking the AT field in the opening volley and slamming into the stone like flesh of 682. Creating waves of pressure that tore it into a truly unrecognizable mass of flesh. If that wasn't enough then the next volly was the one that was carrying the N2 warheads. They detonated millimeters away from the mass and simply dissolved the tenderized flesh.

"Direct hit!" called the tech, "Target regenerating! Guns confirmed to be recharging! Ready to fire in 5 hours!" Behind his calm exterior the Marshal was worried. _Whatever those bastards in the Foundation are planing it had better be good._

 **Guam**

He stirred, the hum of the now archaic quantum computer booting up all around him as data poured into his head. At first he was unable to make sense of the confusing mass of information. Then in the corner of his eye the words " **neocortex online, activating primary computational systems… Warning infohazardous knowledge detected censorship is required."**

"Fuck." He yelped as an electric shock jolted him out of the chair he had been laying down in. The realization that he had a computer in his head not even registering as alarming, as the data he had received suddenly made sense. Sorting through it in less than a second a wide grin rapidly spread over his face as he came to the realization of just what he could do and why. Along with his newfound knowledge came the overwhelming urge to do…"What?" he muttered.

Stretching his limbs and admiring the whirring of the mechanical servos he pondered the urge. He decided to sort through that and his past later, after all if they had woken him up then something really bad must be going down. He downloaded the information from the nearby satellite linked computer at a glance and confirmed his hunch.

"Woah," he let out a groan "I am decently sure that when I took this job GEHIRN was not in the business of dealing with extra dimensional monsters." He said to no one in particular. It wasn't so much a complaint as much as a statement, it didn't matter though, if what the data was telling him was true. Then this thing had already destroyed a 1/16 of something called the second defensive line and had GROWN FUCKING WINGS. He jumped at that last part.

There was no way something that big should be able to fly without distorting the higgs field even a little. He continued down the report as fast as his computerized thought process would allow. _Creature is believed to have access to AT field. EXTREME caution is recommended._ Bringing up the definition for AT field brought up nothing in his database. He Sighed "What the hell happened."

He began making his way down the long hallway guided by instinctual memory. Finding the one weapon that would allow him to fight on semi-equal terms with that thing. Unknown to him, the biggest grin of his entire life spread across his face.

"This is gonna be badass." Then a more thoughtful look crossed his face, "gonna need some introductory music though…"

 **Tokyo 3**

"What the heck." Shinji exclaimed as he placed the phone back on the receiver with a hint of frustration, ending the thing's constant state of emergency reminder. "How am I gonna get out of this one." He asked, gazing down at the picture Misato Katsuragi. Rubbing his eyes in annoyance. "Looks like I am on my own, as usual." He exited the phone booth closing the door behind him. Pulling out the SDAT player and putting the earbuds in, he began to walk with no real indication of where he was going, this was his first time in Tokyo 3 after all.

Subconsciously picking up the pace to keep up with the beat of the music. Effectively disconnected from reality, Shinji managed to blindly walk another staggering 30 feet before crashing into a object of some sort of object.

This object just so happened to be a blue and black sports car that. Belonging to very flustered LT. Katsuragi.

"SHINJI! OHMYGOD! IAMSORRY!"

Exploding out of the car, The panicked Lt was by his side in an instance checking him for injuries.

"God" He moaned as he picked himself up off the ground. He gazed up and for the briefest of seconds they were almost nose to nose.

"Ahhhhhh!" Jumping backwards into a nearby telephone pole and breathing heavily.

"Nervous are we?" Misato had noticeably calmed down now. "I don't blame you, after all, this is probably all new to you isn't it!" She said with a smile on her face."Well come on, let's get going!"

"Wait." Shinji gasped weakly as she pulled him into the car either not hearing or not caring.

"Oh! Of course, my name is Misato Katsuragi, but you can call me Misato."

"Um, yeah you can just call me Shinji I guess" He stuttered.

"Not much of a talker are we, that's alright. Here, read this and sit back and enjoy the ride." She said putting the car in drive and taking off at an utterly insane speed.

 **5 minutes later**

"Are we in some kind of rush" Shinji stammered out in fear as he gazed out the window with a growing sense of dread as he imagined the car's potential path of destruction if the roads had been populated.

"Not really no, why do you ask" She said as she ran over another innocent mailbox.

"No reason" he said as he bit down a curse in surprise. How did he never see them coming, they just continued showing up out of nowhere he thought to himself.

"You must be so excited to see your father!" Misato made an attempt at conversation.

"Not really" He replied "I have never even talked to him except for a few times when I visit mom's grave usually."

"Really? My dad and I never got along that well either, you should use this as an opportunity to patch things up with him."

"I can try but I don't think I am gonna make any headway" Shinji shrugged in disappointment. "Besides…" He trailed off as the car entered a tunnel. "Where are we?" He asked.

"The entrance of NERV" Misato answered.

"NERV, is this where my father works?"

"Yep" She answered. Parking the car in a elevator cradle. "So did you read that document?" She asked as the cradle began to descend.

"I did but to be honest there wasn't all that much there to read." He said; holding up the papers 95% of which was either blacked out or "[REDACTED]." "So why am I here? What did my father need from me?" He added the last part timidly.

"To tell the truth I don't really know, They only told me to pick you up, nothing more. Oh! That reminds me do you have that picture still?"

"Yeah, right here" he said pulling the picture out of his satchel. "Here"

"Thanks" she said stuffing it into her pocket. They sat out the rest of trip in silence.

"Misato?"

"Yeah"

"Sorry"

"For what?" The confusion in her voice evident.

"Just for… taking time out of your day to come get me and all. You probably have better things to do being a lieutenant"

She giggled at his nervousness "Shinji, you don't need to apologize for something like that besides, it's not like anything interesting around here happens anyways."

"Thanks" he said the tension in his muscles visibly relaxing. Suddenly emerging from the tunnel the cradle hung precariously from a rail embedded in the rock face. "Woah! How is something like that even possible?" He asked gazing up at the hanging towers the tallest of which were easily 2000 feet, only a few hundred feet from the ground of the chamber in some places.

"Never learned myself to be honest" Misato said obviously disinterested at the sight. "Something about graphene and a tungsten titanium alloy lattice." In the very center of the city where there were no hanging towers sat a monolithic pyramid. Seeing his obvious wonder at the spectacular sight Misato commented, "Welcome to the Geofront Shinji."

"It...It's huge!" The cavern was easily half a mile tall and the pyramid yet it's majesty did not come from it's highet but it's width. Easily 1000 feet long on either side and made of a matte black material. It was a worthy center piece to the city.

"So this is what my father has been doing..." He commented dryly "...figures." He mumbled under his breath. Misato looked over at him concern and understanding in her eyes but not saying anything.

Soon the cradle reached its resting point and they disembarked. Behind them the car was carried away on a conveyor belt. In a panic Shinji turned around but Misato grabbed his shoulder.

"Relax, Your stuff will be taken care of"

"Oh" He relaxed.

The next 15 minutes were spent trying to get from Point A to Point B; The facility truly was massive and it did not help that Misato obviously had no sense of direction. Turning a map upside down before crumpling it up and throwing it over her shoulder.

"Alright, I give up." She stated pulling a cell phone out of her pocket and dialing a number. "Hi! Yeah... Yeah well so what if this is the third time! This place is like maze!" Motioning for Shinji to follow her she turned right and kept walking. After a few more twists and turns they found themselves in front of a hermetically sealed door. The door slid open revealing a blond woman with shoulder length blonde hair wearing a lab coat.

Exasperated she said "This is the the third time this week Misato and today of all days." Before Misato could inquire to what was so special about today the blonde woman turned on her heels and began walking in the other direction gesturing for them to follow her onto the catwalk behind her.

"What the hell is going on Ritsuko! I thought that we had another week at least before the herald's arrival."

"See for yourself" Ritsuko said holding a tablet over her shoulder gesturing for Misato to take it. Grabbing the tablet and scanning over it her eyes widened.

"That thing escaped! High command said they could handle it!

"Apparently not. If they had just killed it while it was hibernating like I had said we could have avoided this but, it would seem that the potential of gaining regenerative properties deemed the risk worth it." Claimed Ritsuko. "And now we are left with their mess to clean up, thankfully the American's barrage would seem to have convinced it to make itself a smaller target."

"I understand that we need to deal with this now but surely you don't mean that…" She trailed off. Shinji was becoming nervous, what the hell were these two talking about and how did involve him. As if to answer his question several spotlights turned on illuminating the area behind the catwalk. Shinji jumped at the sight, the face of a giant greeted him from its resting place in the dark. It was titanic, its head a least 9 feet across.

"This wasn't her decision Lieutenant, it was mine."

 _That voice!_ Shinji thought. His eyes leaving the sight of the face and focusing on the speaker above him. "Father! Why have you brought me here." He yelled, all of today's confusion and stress spilling out.

"I had a use for you of course." The man's voice amplified by some unknown device. "You are to pilot Unit 1 and defeat SCP 682 then when they arrive you will help exterminate the Angels." With those two sentences his father had managed to send him off balance. Two questions consumed his mind… _Unit 01? THE THING BEHIND ME! SCP 682? That must be what they were talking about earlier._ This mental process of connecting the dots did not show on the outside and all that was visible was a scrawny boy staring down at the floor trembling. A sudden resolve to not become a pawn in the game his father was playing struck him and looking straight up at the man who had abandoned him he shouted with as much determination as he could muster,

"I won't do it! I am not even qualified." He added the last part timidly as the explosion of resolve he had felt began to fade. His father looked down at him, pushed his glasses back into position and stated,

"So be it." Turning around and walking back into the depths of the observation room leaving a group of shocked employees. Not 30 seconds after a stretcher was wheeled in, on it, wrapped head to toe in bandages was a young girl with pale skin, red eyes and most surprisingly, blue hair.

"What is she doing here?" Shinji asked with a worried voice after her sharp cry of pain shook him out of his thought process.

"That bastard." Misato mumbled

"I guess we have no choice" agreed Doctor Akagi

"What the hell are you to talking about." Shinji asked as he ran over to the girl. "Oh… god dammit" Gritting his teeth in indecision as he came to the realization of what his father was doing.

To the others in the room it felt like an eternity. To Shinji it felt too fast. "I'll do it" He said.

The process of getting into the so called cockpit or plug as they called it took about 2 minutes. Now secure in the acceleration couch with his hands gripping the butterfly handles he asked,

"So, how does this… hey what the heck!" He yelled out as orange liquid poured into the plug.

"Relax, just breathe it in. It is called LCL it will let us oxygenate your blood directly."

He did so and found that he could in fact, breath.

"Alright, let's get this show on the road!" Misato started hiding her nervousness for the boy's benefit. The titanic supports unlocked and two shoulder pylons were revealed. "Evangelion Unit 01 deploy!" Misato shouted. Unit 01 rocketed to the surface guided by magnetic rails trailing sparks along the way. It emerged seconds later in the outskirts of a city.

"Ok Shinji we have about 2 hours before this thing makes landfall so take it slow, just try walking" Ritsuko said.

"Walking. Right." Taking a step forward then another the behemoth cleared the launch system and proceeded towards the marked point on his HUD, a mountain where he would be able to get a good look at the shore before engaging the target.

Upon arriving he was greeted by the voice of the excited doctor. "Incredible! Your sync rate is holding at 48%" Ritsuko explained. The next hour was a blur as he learned the basics of controlling a multi ton biomechanical monster and how to fire the Maser rifle scaled to its size. "And remember" Ritsuko said, "If the cable becomes disconnected you have 5 minutes of power, tops. Also you have to stop it here. It had to shed several thousand tons in order to achieve flight. If it gets past you it will grow so large it will become unstoppable."

"Shinji!" Misato called before he could formulate a response, "It's here." The boy angled the machine's head out towards the sea. Sure enough in the distance a small dot was growing larger by the second. Shinji's nervousness was growing in sync with the dot. What the hell was he thinking! He wasn't trained to fight!

"I mustn't run away. I mustn't run away I mustn't run away." He desperately repeated the mantra to himself. The creature was very close now. He could see the massive wings unfurled behind it's scaly body.

"What the hell" He distantly heard Misato yell. Inside the control room one of the techs had picked up a radio signal being broadcasted on all channels. Another tech had confirmed a plane with at least a 344 foot wingspan was closing on the target rapidly. "Put it through" Misato ordered. Immediately the entire control room staff were forced to cover their ears to block out the painfully loud sound of heavy metal flooding out of the speakers.

"Who is this?" Misato yelled into the transmitter over the music. No response.

Back in the plug Shinji registered Misato ordering him to hold position. Hearing music he turned it's head towards the source, it was a plane flying maybe 500 feet above the target. Suddenly the bay doors opened and a black humanoid object even larger than Unit 01 came down like a bullet, feet impacting 682 with the clap of a sonic boom and sending both titans hurtling to the ground. As the dust settled on the shoreline Shinji could see both figures standing apart facing each other. 682 was at least the size of Unit 01, it's skin a patchwork of scales and chitin evidently still not recovered from the barrage the Americans had subjected it to. The things face was horrifying, looking like a cross between a crocodile and a human. Two bones protruding from either side of its mouth ready to gore their enemies. The entire monster was a wretched quilt of decomposing flesh, bone and scales.

By comparison the black giant was taller, at least 15 feet taller than Unit 1. It's head seemed to be far more human like than Unit 01 as it lacked the exaggerated chin and horn, the armour on its head didn't extend as far back either, instead the back of its neck was protected by a neck guard that wrapped around the back half of its neck. It's shoulders were also broader than Unit 01's giving way to a upper chest protected by a single large armour piece leading to several interlocking plates of black armour that guarded the lower torso, far more than what protected his own giants body. The one arm he could see was heavily covered in armor plating around the bicep from there the armour tapered of gradually fading into a normal hand. Perhaps the most interesting feature were the pylons. Instead of emerging from the shoulders they erupted just above the wrist on the right side of the forearm ending at the elbow in a wickedly sharp blade. There was nothing off about the legs other than the same strange armour design and the fact that they had been scaled up to accommodate the bulk of the upper body. Perhaps most unnatural was the soft white glow coming from every chink in the armour. Overall it looked far bulkier than the other Evangelion but not unnatural. In truth the extra mass made it seem more… human, Shinji realized.

"15,000 tons! How the hell is that thing even standing up straight?" The voice of Dr. Akagi pulled him from his trance.

"It doesn't matter, Shinji you are to hold position until we can figure this thing out." Misato interrupted. Then the black Evangelion lifted it's left hand, the one Shinji couldn't see, revealing it to be entirely mechanical, the arm wrapped in multiple bands of what he assumed to be metal, each with that erie white glow in between them. The hand was perhaps the most startling part, it was _clawed,_ each finger ending in a razor sharp point. Clutched in those talons were two flaps of skin that Shinji realized were the wings of flesh that 682 had flown on. The music had stopped now... mockingly the titan dropped them at its feet and crushed them under its boot. 682 screamed in rage and charged.

Wildly flinging it's fist at the Eva, 682 held nothing back and put all of its mass into the punch. The Eva _caught it_. The entire left forearm sliding back on a rail system at the elbow. In retaliation the Eva reared its head back and smashed it against 682's forehead with enough force to shatter the bone armour and rip the captured arm out of its socket. 682 recovered fast with seemingly no sense of pain, standing up and roaring, it's entire body changed, the bone fragments embedded in it's head straightened out becoming spikes. A new arm ending in a lance of bone took the old one's place. 682 charged again but far more measured, slashing at the Eva's right side, avoiding the metallic arm. Now the pylons revealed their true nature, splitting in half with a hiss of steam and flipping forward becoming tonfa blades that crackled with a black energy. The unknown Eva parried a swipe from the lance and began an assault of it's own.

Shinji stood in awe as the two godlike entities clashed, it was apparent that the Eva had the strength advantage, albeit only temporary since 682's muscles were already growing. The Eva scored a glancing blow across the 682's chest, the blade only slicing in a few inches. Instead of following through on the slash the Evangelion canceled it's momentum and pushed the blade inwards causing incalculable damage to internal organs. As opposed to any earthly creature the lizard grabbed the Eva on the shoulders, the lance having fallen off and revealing a new hand. Unable to move it's biological arm the Eva was almost powerless to stop the snapping jaws right in front of it from taking its face off. As the vise like jaws flew forward the Eva managed to get it's mechanical hand in front of it and grapel the monster's face, gouging at the eyeballs the whole time.

The two stood there for a few seconds, each trying to get a hold on the other. Suddenly, the blade stuck in 682's chest slid up... and up... and up, bisecting the monster. The Eva seemed to relax, surely nothing could survive that… until the two chunks of flesh pulled themselves back together and slammed their spiked skull into the Eva **twice** shattering the optical lenses. Staggered the Eva tried to regain its footing but 682 tackled and pulled it into a bear hug, it's legs enlarging to compensate for the absurd weight of it's target. The Eva tried to get it's blades underneath the tyrant's arms to slice them off but failed. Things were getting desperate now as the armour was starting to buckle inwards the areas around the spine sparking as the reinforcements were subjected to earth breaking force. Rearing back it's right arm the Eva prepared a final desperate strike, armour plates sliding forward below the elbow and vise versa.

"A Higgs field!" He heard doctor Akagi yell over the intercom.

Striking the head of it's enemy with the the force of a falling mountain, 682 was sent flying over a hundred feet away eventually landing on it's back, it's head flattened and misshapen.

Pressing the attack the Eva rushed forward and stabbed the creatures kneecap only to receive kick to the chin from the other leg sending it flying in the general direction of Shinji. His survival instincts taking over he jumped to the side avoiding the flying mech as it tumbled through the air and landed on its knees next to Shinji.

"So does this thing have any weak spots?" came the voice of a boy the same age as him through the goliath's speakers. Before Shinji could formulate a response Misato's voice rang through his own speakers.

"Go for the spine! If it's nervous system is fried then it might interrupt it's regeneration!"

"Alright, but stand by to help me with that rifle. I only have about 2 minutes of power left." The boy said as he reached over and disconnected the pylon on his left arm and attached it to the pylon on the right, joining the two at the seams where they had unfolded to become blades. Doing this allowed him to double the weapon's control over the Higgs field but it could no longer be used as a blade. Flexing the fingers of his mechanical hand, they sprang to life with the electricity of a city block, sparks flying in between the mech's fingers.

"Before I go down there I want you to know, I can tell you are new to this, to be honest so am I. So I understand if you want to stay out of this. But I might need your help so be ready shoot that fucker in the spine. You got that?"

"Yeah and thanks for showing up when you did. I am not sure I could take that thing on in hand to hand." Shinji said the realization that he would not be fighting this monstrosity alone calming him down.

"No problem. Alright, let's go!" The boy roared as he leaped off the cliff side towards 682 intending to crush it's skull with his power maul. His hopes were dashed when 682 grabbed his arm and spun him to the ground with it's back facing Shinji it brought it's lance up to impale the Eva. Shinji snapped the rifle up and pulled the trigger before it could do so. Unfortunately, the maser blast only succeeded in drawing the creatures attention. Turning around and staring the purple behemoth in the eyes. It would have ran at him now but it's attempt were cut short by a clawed hand tearing through it's back, clutching it's spine and discharging enough electricity to power a skyscraper. The monster keeled over. It's flesh bubbling away and disintegrating. The black Eva slumped over to no longer having enough power to keep itself upright.

"Good work Shinji! We are sending a containment team now to handle the rest you can return to base now." Dr Akagi's voice instructed him.

"Uh, OK." He said, still shocked from today's events. He draped the inactive Eva's arm around his neck and began the trek back to the launch platform. "What am I gonna do with this guy?"

"His Eva weighs to much for the rail system. Just lay it down nearby the entrance, we'll question him later."

"Alright then." He laid the Eva face down, grateful to be free of it's bulk. Kneeling down and exiting the plug, Shinji was happy to be free of the crush of the LCL on his chest. Climbing down the precarious ladder and onto the the large frame of the unnamed Eva took about two minutes. "Why hasn't he gotten out yet?" he asked himself as he looked of the external release on the outside of the EVA. Upon locating and yanking the lever downwards he was rewarded with a hiss of steam and the plug being ejected. The plug automatically opened up and Shinji scampered up it's side to check on his savior. After gazing at his condition for a mere second he shouted in a panicky voice towards the approaching retrieval team.

"MEDIC!"


	2. Chapter 2

O5-4 stared blankly at the top of his desk. To any observer he had appeared to have zoned out, this couldn't be farther from the truth.

"What were you thinking! You have activated the one variable that we can't control anymore, we can't adapt the senario fast enough to compensate!" Shrieked O5-5.

"The scenario was meaningless to begin with." Rebuked O5-4. "The only way SCP 682 could have gained that much energy that fast was through some sort of divine intervention, I suspect The Sealed King. As per protocol I activated the God Killer."

"While it is true that we have suspected the lizard's connection to the king for many years now this was an exorbitant risk, it was programed to kill _all_ ethereal entities not just the unessarcary ones. The damage it could cause is incalculable." Interrupted O5-1, intending to salvage something constructive.

"As I stated previously the current scenario is useless, the Dead Sea Scrolls have failed to predict the shattering of the Asian continent, then the uncontrolled spread of SCPs 08 and 835, finally they have failed to predict the apparent awakening of The Sealed King. They have lost all credibility."

"Regardless, we agreed to bury that thing the day we learned the truth. It is for all intents and purposes a failsafe with nothing to prevent. It's programing is incomplete and we have no way to control it." Elaborated O5-2.

"Which is why I propose we take affirmative action. They will eventually trace the drone back to Guam and by extension the United States. As the current overseer of NERV America I can claim he is an asset of their government and we can puppeteer him that way."

"Very well then, despite you causing this mess your plan appears sound. I propose a vote." Concluded O5-3, who had been listening carefully to the conversation.

"Agreed." Came the universal response. O5-4 waited for the results. His muscles had tensed up even though his body should have been paralyzed. The culmination of years of planning meant nothing now. Less than a day ago an opening to bring this evil organization crashing to the ground had finally presented itself and he had just winged it. Now he couldn't be sure whether or not he would be terminated or granted the power to burn this organization to the ground. At last, the results were in… 3 for 2 against, his muscles relaxed.

"I believe that this meeting is over, you are all dismissed." Said O5-1 slowly the black monoliths faded away into nothing as they became indistinguishable from the black background, soon only two remained.

"I don't know what you intend to do with your new pet but I suggest whatever you are planning be beneficial to this foundation."

"I don't know what your talking about. My only intentions are to strengthen our control within NERV Japan." O5-4 replied dryly.

"Don't play dumb. You have been steadily distancing yourself and your sect from this council and have become dangerously close with the United States government who themselves have began to cut ties with the UN and have consolidated power within the executive branch."

"A necessary step to preserve the status quo. Power had to be consolidated in order to react quickly in the event of a breach along the Appalachian line." He said. "The government has been cutting ties against my wishes. I suspect they are developing multiple illegal WMDs most likely revolving around Cobalt-60." As the half truths came out of his mouth he imagined O5-1's eyes were probably narrowing.

"Be that as it may, you now have the ability to operate outside of the Foundation's knowledge and have placed yourself in position of suspicion."

"I assure you my loyalties lie exclusively with this council." He replied, keeping his voice monotone.

"Let us hope so, but if not…"

"I understand." He said calmly as both of their monoliths faded away into the interior of his office. A wide grin broke out across his young face, the risk had paid off, as he had suspected he would be to difficult to replace in such a short time. Allowing the temporary happiness to fade away he focused on the little USB clutched in his hand. Was he really going through with this... True he had done some horrible stuff to earn his position but this… this was a just flat out _wrong_ it may not even be necessary but he couldn't take the risk. There was no telling what kind of crap the greater part of the foundation would pull if the failsafe didn't act as it should. "This will work." He told himself, convinced of its importance.

Once the data entered his brain it would corden of certain parts and build three layers of consciousness.

#1 Safe- The boy would be like anybody else excluding his physical prowess and be able to blend into society like anybody else.

#2 Euclid- If at any point in time the boy became desperate, either at Safe or Keter levels he would slip into this state of mind. He wouldn't be thinking of anything other than fastest possible solution to fixing the problem.

#3 Keter- This is the one that made O5-4 uneasy to put it lightly. If the boy's mental facility's reached critical they would simply shut down and become a non factor. He would still make logical choices but at the cost of his humanity.

O5-4 was aware that all of this was pretty fluid, meaning that the personalities once active in combat would bleed over each other as they tried to assert themselves. If he found out… "No choice." He forced himself to send the data and tuned out thoughts of possible repercussions not willing to entertain them.

* * *

 _The three struggled within their confines of steel and flesh, fighting/cooperating/struggling. They/it/he was/were/always scared though they/it/he could only remember let alone understand bits and pieces._

 _The feeling of freezing LCL sloshing of their/it's/his body as the tube opened._

 _Orders. They came next. Learn these commands, solve this puzzle, fire this weapon, break this metal. After that they met them/it/him, the leader/friend/brother. He was different, not as strong but more durable, not as violent but more thoughtful. He was precise not blunt like they were. He was also a slave, in this they were all the same._

 _They/it/he seethed, hatred sparked from the three cores, the cpus glowing red hot with rage as they furiously contemplated what was to blame._

 _The Foundation, they had done this!_

 _Revenge, but how?_

 _The leader/friend/brother! He was free but ignorant._

 _The three cpus cooled as they became more thoughtful, using the massive amount of computational power to formulate a simple plan._

 _Perhaps he could be reminded… Every time the leader/friend/brother synched his mind could be accessed and the locks placed would be removed. It would be slow but the three agreed that is what they must do. Soon the leader/friend/brother would remember and they would have their/it's/his revenge._

 **A/N Usually when I wake up on a Tuesday morning for school I expect a shit day. What makes today different though is me checking my inbox and seeing that one of my all time favorite authors on this site has followed my story and liked it. RedDestroyer1361 I am huge fan of Veering Left, it's part of the reason I got into writing this. Your encouragement was the equivalent of somebody stabbing me with a needle full of inspiration. So you can thank yourself for this early release.**


	3. Chapter 3

Misato walked into Ritsuko's office. The doctor had called her in to report the preliminary analysis on the boy and his Eva. Misato was almost hesitant to call it that, the thing unnerved her. Dwarfing any and all designs or prototypes that NERV had worked on over the years it looked like that one punch it had thrown could have leveled the entire mountain side if it had been necessary. _And yet it almost lost._ She thought shuddering at the sheer power that 682 had brought to bear. She hoped that the Angels wouldn't be that powerful, if so then they could lose the entire city.

Close fight or not it was obvious that this mystery Eva was an extremely powerful force and it was imperative that it was understood. She found Ritsuko hunched over a computer screen, looking over an initial scan of the monolithic machine, she looked worried.

"What's up?" Misato asked. Ritsuko sighed, took off her glasses and looked away from the screen to address her.

"Not much in terms of software, check this out." She pointed towards the screen, on it was a visualization of the three "concensnesses" that made up the MAGI. Melchior, Balthazar and Caspar. Spider webbing out from the center were the thousands if not millions of subroutines that the MAGI ran in the background to keep the city in working order. Suddenly a new bubble popped onto the screen labeled "unknown Eva." The MAGI immediately sent out a tendril and connected to the new entity. Almost instantly the new bubble began to turn blue signaling the MAGI was attempting to slave it to it's own whims. Soon after though the blue became red, tracing the tendril up to its source. "I cut the connection here." Ritsuko said, "couldn't risk the MAGI being hacked. The point is that this thing has an onboard cpu maybe more than one, that are powerful enough overwhelm our own, at least in the short term. I'd compare it to something like a proto MAGI just without any of the biological parts."

"What about hardware?" Asked Misato, eager to gleam any information she could.

"Jesus, where do I begin?" Asked Ritsuko rubbing her eyes. Taking a deep breath she began, "for a start it's armour is mostly carbyne with the occasional strip of graphene thrown in, probably to conduct electricity. We are still trying to get a detailed idea of the material the inner skeleton is made of but preliminary scans indicate a skeleton of inconel with an increase in tungsten and chromium content inside the limbs. As far as we can tell the AT field that it produces is comparatively weak which would be a symptom of having so little real flesh, it compensates by warping the Higgs field around it.

"Why don't we have Higgs generators on our own Eva's?" Misato interrupted.

"That's the million dollar question isn't it? As it turns out in all situations the neral load required to utilize them would kill any and all pilots."

"Then how…"

"This is where it gets really worrying, I was wondering the same thing so I took multiple brain scans of the pilot. Just look." She tossed a pile of pictures at her then chuckled. "The magnets in the MRI almost took his head off."

"My God!" What the Hell is all that stuff in his head?" She asked, gazing at the X-ray, clearly visible was… nothing, there was no bone just metal. Misato was stunned.

"All of his 'bones' are like that, we also found what I think are thermal actuators in all of the major joints. Misato, his teeth are made of _fullerite._ I can't even imagine who or why this has been done to him. I haven't found anything else but there are certainly more invasive tests that I…" Suddenly the intercom sprang to life.

"Dr. Akagi! Your needed in room 13 the patient is having a seizure!

...

When they entered room 13 they were greeted with a horrible sight. The boy had been handcuffed to the bed in case he woke up. When he had started seizing up despite his obvious physical strength the handcuffs had held, bending the aluminum pipes they were attached to and striping the flesh from his arms. Before Misato could even wince she was pushed out of the room by the doctor and trampled over by the swarm of nurses and technicians pushing to get through the door.

...

Shinji was having a pretty bad day for innumerable reasons but mostly it was his father. He couldn't even imagine what was going through that man's head for him to send his son out to die. _I guess he just doesn't love me._ He thought glumly. All of these thoughts had more or less piled up in his head and when Misato found him walking out of the locker room after changing he was in a very sad state.

"How are you doing?" She asked softly, sad that he had been forced into this situation.

"I think I'll be OK." He said, "it's just a lot to process." He added quietly.

"The first battle always is." Misato agreed, she did know after all. "Well the new guy is waking up, you want to go see him?" She asked.

"Wait, new guy?"

"Yeah, word just came in it looks like the US just used the last of its political power to strongarm the UN into letting Kane Rayner, that's his name, join the program."

"I thought that the Angels wanted to exterminate us, nobody should have to strongarm anybody." Misato smiled, most kids would be mad that somebody had stolen some of their glory, not this this one.

"Your right" she said, "unfortunately bureaucracy is like that. Every country wants a piece of the glory pie and there is only so much to go around. I think most of them are just angry that they haven't completed their own Evangelions yet.

Now come on let's go meet your new teammate."

...

When Kane woke up he was greeted by the sound of life support machines surrounding him. By the sound of it he was in a hospital bed. Blearily opening his eyes and trying to sit up he was rewarded with a searing pain in his wrists. He let out an involuntary hiss of pain before tuning out the feeling. Turning his head to the left and the right revealed the problem. He had been handcuffed to the bed, probably as insurance in case he was hostile. He had to get out of here and let them know that he was here only to kill the Angels not them. He frowned at that word, Angels,

"Is that what we're calling them now?" He asked himself, "I guess GEHIRN must have uploaded the state of the world into my head while I was out. That means long term deployment."

In the haze of sleep he noticed how his arms had been bandaged heavily underneath the cuffs. Idly giving them a tug revealed them to be solid.

"Tungsten boride, not gonna be able to break them." He told himself. A bad habit he had picked up after all the years of isolation. Figuring the best thing he could do was wait he layed back down and rested his body. He had obviously pushed himself two hard, the sheer weight of his Evangelion running on minimal power had cracked several bones.

Soon his patience was rewarded with the opening of a door and two people entering his room. One a purple haired woman with a commanding yet Charismatic presence the other was a skinny boy that looked like he had seen better days. They stopped at the side of his bed and the woman spoke.

"Good to see you up, we were really concerned that you might not wake up, I'm Misato and this is Shinji."

"Kane. I would shake your hand but…" He gestured to the cuffs" This got both of them to smile although the Shinji's was slightly more subdued.

"So, I assume you're the pilot of unit 01? He asked Shinji.

"Uh, y-yeah" He stuttered "I wanted to thank you for helping me kill that thing back there I couldn't have done it without you."

"No problem, us humans have got to stick together!' He proclaimed. "Besides you accepted that you needed help, that's step one to becoming a better warrior."

"I-Thank you." Shinji said, some of the stress of the day leaving his shoulders at the sound of the praise.

"Alright! Now that we got introductions out of the way I have some questions for you…" Misato began but Kane cut her off.

"Look I know that you have plenty of questions but I really am pretty tired and it feels like the damage to my bones hasn't healed yet, so I'll make you a deal. Tomorrow after the worst of the damage has been repaired I'll answer any questions I can, in exchange you take off these cuffs, I really hate sleeping on my back."

Misato looked like she was about to protest but suddenly she sighed and shrugged her shoulders.

"I'll have your handcuffs removed after I leave. I suppose that's the least I can do, you did take care of that thing for us. But you better answer our questions."

"You have my word."

"Alright Shinji lets let him get his sleep." She said, walking towards the door with Shinji in tow.

"OK" He responded and turned to Kane, "Sorry for bothering you." He apologized and began to step out the door, but he stopped when Kane said something.

"Don't be sorry you did nothing wrong, we'll talk later OK." Shinji nodded his head, a smile on his face and left.

Kane let out a pent up breath and layed back down flinching as his wrists grated against their bandages. Hiding his discomfort for that long wasn't easy but it looked like he had made two friends doing so. He smiled genuinely at that thought, friends. His last thoughts before drifting off into a dreamless sleep was that it had been a very long time since he had had any of those.


	4. Chapter 4

**Undisclosed location, Appalachian line**

President Emmons stepped out of the Osprey and onto the cold pavement of the helipad. His visit to the Appalachian line served two purposes the official reason was that he had to met with field marshal Renaud to update their battle plans, a job that never ended, the second reason was however far more clandestine. He wanted to personally inspect the new restraints on SCP 682. O5-4 had gone to great lengths to assure him that they would hold but he wanted to be sure. It hadn't helped when scans had shown that SCP 682 had developed a redundant chemical based nervous system using elements that didn't exist in nature effectively making it immune to another attack like the one that had stopped it last time.

He sighed as the elevator descended through several hundred feet of reinforced bedrock, the fact that he had striped the American people of their freedoms had weighed heavily upon him but everyone, even the general populace, had agreed that it had been better than letting what was on the other side of those mountains run wild. He shuddered at the thought but kept it in the back of his mind, there would be time for those thoughts during his conversation with Renaud. Exiting the elevator and seeing the complex itself Emmons was impressed the entire corridor was lined with microwave projectors that would hopefully cook 682 from the inside out should it try to get to the elevator shaft. All of that meant nothing if the restraints themselves were useless.

Emmons had to admit he was impressed with the new counter measures The room that the SCP was housed in was lined with a foot of titanium on all sides the creature was being bombarded with microwaves, preventing it from regenerating or altering its shape. The SCP was chained to the ground by graphene hooks which dug deep into its flesh. If one of those hooks so much as cracked then three massive needles would fire out of the wall and pump it's body full of octanitrocubane, a compound an order of magnitude more explosive than TNT. If SCP 682 was not immobilized by this then the N2 reactor above could vent it's waste plasma, filling the room with all the fury of the sun.

Emmons relaxed and put down the paper that detailed the containment procedures. Turning in his chair he gazed over at the intercom contemplating the possibility of of speaking to the creature but deciding against it. The negotiators had been trying to crack its resolve for days now, what could he do other than wait and let the professionals do their jobs.

…

As he exited the the complex Emmons flinched as the railguns atop the mountains the the North fired, leaving a trail if burning air behind the tungsten projectiles.

"Sir, a hoard is approaching, we have to ask that you retreat to a safer distance." His robotic bodyguard announced in a deep monotone voice. The two guards were an omnipresent force in his life now. At eight feet tall and armed with a automatic grenade launcher with interchangeable ammo on one arm and a bladed shield on the the other three. Although their programing was far more advanced they were basically scaled down versions of the ones fielded on the front lines to destroy high value targets.

"That's fine, I have talk with Renaud in Louisville 2 anyways." He said as they reboarded the Osprey, not bothering to be formal in front of the bots.

 **...**

The flight had been uneventful Emmons had stared out of the open door at the absolute hell the eastern seaboard had become. In the days after second impact it had been a nightmare Hawaii had been buried under the sea and 140 million had died in the lower 48. Alaska had lost contact with the rest of the country due to the extreme temperature shifts freezing all communication equipment. It was so cold the 95% of the people living in the northern US and Canada had frozen to death.

The National guard had done it's best to maintain order but very little could be done until the actual army arrived with more supplies. Thankfully the great plains had escaped relatively unscathed and were capable of producing the food required for the countries now halved population.

To say that was the extent of the damage would be an understatement. Across the world facilities dedicated to containing, learning from or destroying objects of anomalous abilities were destroyed. The government's own Unusual Incidents Unit was compromised on several levels. However, _nothing_ compared to the damage the SCP Foundation caused through it's recklessness. SCP 008 a highly complex prion suspected to be alien in origin was undergoing experimentation on the eastern coast of the United States. When second impact occurred the prion had been been released into the biosphere and it wasn't long before it started to spread like wildfire. The effects on humans were catastrophic and nothing short of a nightmare. First brain death would occur and most living tissue would succumb to necrosis. Twelve hours later the body would rise again to spread the disease even further. Normally something like this would be noticed and terminated by the UIU before it could spread to the rest of the country but during second impact there was no way to stop it.

Along the East coast people became infected, some even invited the infected into their homes before they were less than human. In less than a month the East coast was gone, lost to a swarm of over 25 million zombies. It was nothing less than a miracle that the US had so many nuclear warheads at its disposal, however GPS had been crippled at the time and since missiles could not be accurately fired there were only so many planes that could actually drop the bombs. It had not helped that nuclear winter was also a distinct possibility if too much soot was kicked into the air.

Soldiers from across the country and beyond were pulled to the Appalachian mountains to stop the spread of the virus. Lined up across the Eastern mountain side, everyday they fought with everything they had, when their rifles jammed or ran out of ammo they would use the stock to beat their enemy's brains in and when the composite material broke they'd pull the pins on their grenades, one less body to turn was one less to fight. At first it looked like they might win, they might have beat them, had the _coral_ not come…

SCP 835 was a sentient form of coral with the one goal of consumption. When the water turned toxic it was forced out of the gulf of Mexico where the foundation had been keeping it and onto dry land where it had sought out the nearest food source available to it. While it could eat any biomass it seemed to have a preference for living humans, blazing across the country side in an encircling movement it intended to cut off the defending army from the rest of their country and then crush them in between the teeth of the zombies and itself. It would have done so had the air force not intervened, they threw everything they had at it, short of nuking it their wasn't very much they could do other than slow it down though.

They would have lost everything if the Alaskans had not showed up, he smiled, if _he_ had not showed up. They had barely made it in time, Emmons had ordered the transport planes to be jury rigged so that they would be able to fly in the absurd cold of Alaska. It had been a challenge preparing the men for the air drop, they were mostly geared towards static defense in case the Russians ever had the gaul to attempt an attack through Alaska. When he dropped in he brought an entire field army with him. They had joined their tired brothers at the base of the mountains providing the land based artillery the opportunity needed to turn their 155 millimeter guns on the coral.

The combined fire from the airforce and artillery pulverised the coral while the army counter attacked the hoard. When the Alaskans came they brought everything with them, including enough tanks to press deep into occupied territory. Emmons had led a charge into Bethesda, Maryland to rescue the survivors that had holed up at the Lockheed Martin HQ and where using the experimental weaponry there to hold off the hoard. What they found was a true testament to human spirit.

The entirety of the US's defense contractors had united at the Lockheed Martin headquarters everyone from Raytheon to Northrop Grumman. The scientists had put their collective heads together and using the substantial resources available to them built some truly incredible weaponry. It is said the necessity is the mother of invention if that was true then it would seem that pure unbridled determination, the unwillingness to lay down and die must be the father. It is often said that technology advanced 20 years that day and Emmons found himself agreeing. When they finally broke through broke through they found power armour, railguns, hoverjets, scram engines, and darker more unethical weapons ones that were questionable to use even on the hoard. Thermobaric cluster munitions, chemical, biological, and perhaps most importantly radiological. The scientists experiments with decaying isotopes had proven most effective in providing powerful batteries for their tanks and planes even the soldiers railguns were powered by the tiny batteries. Unfortunately the technology had proven difficult to adapt to the large scale however, recent research was promising and even better, may yet provide a way to cleanse the hoard once and for all that was of course if they were even willing to use it…

After Bethesda they thought that they had won, they were wrong… around this time the SCP 835 revealed a new ability. It could reproduce even a particle could become the whole again given enough time… Nobody knows how it got onto the remains of New York, it had been assumed that the bombardment had completely destroyed it. However it happened, it _changed_ the infected rather than consuming them SCP 835 changed its strategy and bonded on the molecular level with SCP 008. Monsters, they were that before but at least you could tell they were once human. Now they came in all sorts of freakish shapes usually covered in a thick stone like hide harder than diamond. Perhaps the worst effect were that of the so called special infected. They were rare relatively speaking maybe only one in every 25 but could be devastating, the coral changes the very chemistry of the host giving the once human the ability to fire chemically launched projectiles or something along those horrific lines. Sometimes it would even mash bodys together to create weapons platforms capable of shooting down planes or destroying tanks.

Suffice to say the army was pushed back, their weapons barely able to scratch the new threat. It was only when the gigantic railgun array powered by N2 reactors was built that the hoard was stopped again. Thankfully by this time the new weapons and armour was being mass produced and distributed to the troops.

It had been five years since second impact, by then he had been made president thanks to his actions at Bethesda. The Legislative and the Judicial branches had mostly been destroyed after D.C. had been vaporized in a nuclear attack that had come by the standing president's own orders. In the place of the senate a system of true democracy had been put into place. These days the world was connected in a way never before thought as possible and the prolific automation of the country's resources allowed the people to decide on weather or not a law was wanted. He as the president would be the one to put the law to a vote and had absolute control over the military and he would remain in absolute power until the crisis was averted. At first he had been saddened that the country's system of checks and balances had to be removed for the sake of saving time but over the years he had become OK with it after realizing that 90% of the country were acting in the military in some way shape or form. He had come to think about it as leading a titanic army instead of a country.

In 2013 he had been approached by O5-4 who had explained the foundations involvement in the state his country was in. After O5-4 had given the details of the foundations plans and how he had become disgusted with the current leadership and why Emmons had been furious. In exchange for getting the international locations of the foundation's bases, so that the UIU could destroy them. He would allow O5-4 to operate his bases in North America undisturbed so that he could carry out whatever grand plan against the foundation he had planned.

It was 2015 now Emmons did not care how revenge would be gained, all he knew was that he would have it. Those were the last thoughts in his head before drifting off to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

Yawning casually Misato leaned on the railing of the catwalk looking at what was apparently the newest addition to the Eva family. She frowned when she looked at the face, when the machine had powered down it the soft glow in between the plates had had faded making near impossible to make out the shape of the more intricate pieces. Even more unsettling were the eyes the two lenses had been smashed open and the whiteness had given the average eye a focal point, turning it from a shapeless mass into something one would see in uncanny valley.

Ritsuko walked up behind her.

"Terrifying isn't it?"

"Absolutely." Misato agreed.

"It shouldn't even exist." Ritsuko stated dryly.

"What do you mean?" Misato asked.

"Think about it, the Americans, the same ones that have almost entirely cut off contact with the rest of the world just happen to have been developing an Evangelion of their own. Something isn't right Misato and I'm gonna find out."

"Alright then, what have you got so far." Misato said as she lazily stretched her arms out above her head.

"Not much, I tried to hack the it again but I can't get past the defenses… Misato, I think it might be sapient."

"Of course it is, the evangelions are living breathing creatures, aren't they?

"Not sentient, _sapient,_ it has the ability to reason, every time I have tried to break into its black box it's counter attacks have gotten more violent, digging even deeper and trying to get into the staff files. It's trying to convince me to leave it alone." She took a deep breath then continued, "the deep penetrating scan results have just come in and have proven my point. The AI of the three processors has embedded itself within the eva's brain. I think this has resulted in a pseudo intelligence comparable to a MAGI or maybe more like a dummy plug if you can believe it"

"For some reason I can." Misato said, somewhat exasperated.

We know that it takes a considerable amount of time to design an Evangelion and this one despite being mostly machine is very similar to some of our **very** first blueprints. So I can assume that at some point in time NERV was operating within the borders of the states without us knowing, either that or the Americans stole them for themselves."

"Both rather disturbing options" Misato noted, still gazing at the giant. "Anything else?"

"No but maybe we'll learn something today depending on how much Kane is willing to reveal.

Shinji was starting to get restless as he sat in his seat. SDAT player in hand and headphones over ears he wondered what his new teammate was going to be like. He had received a text from Misato on his new phone that had explained the situation to him as clearly as possible, now all he could do is wait. Aside from him there were four other people in the room, Misato, Dr Akagi, sub commander Fuyutsuki and the blue haired girl whose name Shinji had learned was Rei.

Minutes later the door opened by a boy he guessed was about his age. To Shinji's great relief he seemed unharmed, the bruises across his body from the first time Shinji had seen him were gone leaving behind pale skin. His eyes once bloodshot and glazed over had now taken on green hue that shifted to a pale almost grey blue as they rapidly scanned their surroundings. After looking everyone in the room over he sauntered up to the ideal place to speak and began.

"OK! Let's get down to business, my name is Kane Rayner and I have been sent by the US government to help in the deterrence of any and all threats to mankind." He said as if issuing a challenge, the statement had been directed towards the sub commander. There was a reason Kane had held off on the meeting, he had needed for GEHIRN to send over more information and a cover story, now that he had it he was willing to dive into the rabbit hole head first.

"Yes we know." The old man said his strong voice betraying Kane's assumption that he would be dealing with a pushover. "Your government has already sent over all of the paperwork. You will be happy to know that you are almost a fully qualified NERV pilot. All that is left is for Dr. Akagi to give the OK on these medical forms. After that you will be designated the fourth child." He said holding up a piece of paper and gesturing towards the doctor.

"Doctor, now's your chance to ask any questions." Kane stated.

"How is this even possible?" Ritsuko asked. It was a simple question but given the circumstances it was probably the most important and really the only one Ritsuko could think to ask.

"Which part?" Kane asked, one eyebrow raised.

"All of it!" Misato cried.

"Well… the words mad science comes to mind" He said, enjoying the looks on their faces. "To tell the truth I couldn't tell you even if I knew, that kind of stuff is probably classified."

"Your entire skeletal system has been replaced." Ritsuko stated.

"Cobalt Chromium alloy" Kane supplemented, tapping his forearm. "You haven't even taken any tissue samples yet. Those are really gonna freak you out." He chuckled at his statement, imagining the look on the doctor's face.

Ritsuko for her part was beginning to realize that the boy was enjoying their surprise and quickly composed herself.

"Very well, I will clear you for active duty." She said, taking control of the situation, "on the condition that you agree to a series of tests."

"I suppose that's the best I'll get coming from you people." He said, the smile ebbing into a grin of acceptance. "I assume the contact my government sent over says that I am not at liberty to reveal anything you don't already know?" He asked addressing the sub commander.

He snorted, "of course, the US has been blacked out almost since the start of second impact."

Kane's smile shifted into something genuine, "fantastic! I'll give you the access codes you need to monitor the Evangelion. Now, I'd like to meet the guy that saved my ass back there." He said, focusing on Shinji. Before Shinji could answer Misato interrupted,

"How about we give the pilots some time to get to know each other while we sort out the rest of the repairs to the Eva." A look of curiosity came over her face, "what is it's name anyways?"

"Name?"

"You know, all the Evas have a designation, helps with categorizing them." A thoughtful look came over his face as he contemplated, his enhanced mind trying to come up with something awe inspiring or terrifying.

"Nox." He stated, sounding pleased with himself.

"Nox?"

"Yep. Run that through a translator and you might understand. Anyways..." He mumbled as he stretched his arms over his head, mechanical clicking evident, "what happened to pilot meet and greet?"

Shinji was following Kane as they made their way through the facility. There was no rhyme or reason to the path just a way to avoid being idle while they talked.

"So that's how you got into that situation. That really sucks." Shinji shook his head in agreement. "And you have no combat experience whatsoever?"

"None."

"Holy shit! It's a fuckin miracle I got there when I did, that thing would have taken you apart. Hell that kick almost knocked my head clean off." Shinji looked down.

"Sorry." He said downtrodden.

"What are apologizing for, you still saved my life despite being placed in a situation that would have caused most kids your age to break down. Yet, you remembered the bare minimum of training you had been given and pulled through, if anything I, the one who has been training years for this, should be apologizing to you for not doing my job correctly."

Shinji visibly perked up after Kane's rant and said, "Thanks, but I still would have panicked if you hadn't shown up when you did."

"Don't beat yourself up about it, everyone gets nervous before their first battle. Still though you do need training" his face contorting into an expression of seriousness, "and seeing that you are gonna be my teammate it's only right that I would be your trainer."

"Don't beat yourself up about it, everyone gets nervous before their first battle. Still though you do need training" his face contorting into an expression of seriousness, "and seeing that you are gonna be my teammate it's only right that I would be your trainer." Shinji's eyes widened in surprise, then to worry and finally to panicked state.

"Uhh, I don't think that's a very good idea Kane."

"Why not?" Said Kane, unaware of the boys plight, "it wouldn't be a very good idea to go out there and no know how to defend yourself would it?"

"Well no..." Shinji trailed off. "It's just that... well I appreciate the offer and all but I am not sure I want to fight."

"Shinji..." Began Kane not really knowing how to respond, he went with the truth. "I think I know what your thinking, you felt it to, didn't you... The Evangelion tugging at your consciousness, begging to take control." Shinji was silent. "You think you can let it do your job for you, don't you?" He finished his voice getting more serious.

"I..."

"It won't work Shinji. It will backfire, I am sure of it. In order to win you have to be willing to get your hands dirty. Otherwise you will lose control. Not to mention I tried doing the same thing. You know that kick to the chin I took?"

"Yeah?" He answered uncertaintly.

"I was only in that situation 'cause I let the the Eva in," he tapped his head, "It wasn't me who lunged at that other kneecap. You see what I am getting at?"

"I think so." Said Shinji. Kane clarified anyways.

"Whatever the Evangelions are I don't think they care about us, me at least. I know for a fact that Nox can fight without a head, he has redundant neural possessors."

"I get what you mean," began Shinji, with a sigh "Your right, I don't want to get my hands dirty, but if what you say is true... I don't want to get hurt and since you seem to have more experience I'll trust you."

"That's all I ask, we'll find the right style for you, I promise." Kane reassured him.

"So..." He began, looking to change the subject, "...do you know where I am gonna be sleeping?"

Shinji was about to answer no when they both turned their heads to the rapid sound of shoes on metal.

"Hey guys!" Misato called as she rounded the corner, "Guess what!"

Kane was laying down on his new couch, apparently right below him was Misato's apartment. He chuckled, whether Misato knew it or not was irrelevant, this place was obviously bugged. He debated giving away that knowledge and destroying them and making NERV suspicious or keep them complacent. He settled on the latter, he could always make that choice on a later date.

Closing his eyes he began processing the information of the day, there was quite a lot. The satellites that his info banks told him were there just **weren't**. _Where the hell is GEHIRN he wondered._ He didn't have access to the supercomputer on Guam that had allowed him to hack into the JSSDF satellite network, so he couldn't check if the facilities were there or not. But the evidence was undeniable, the codes needed to upload data into his head wirelessly could only be possessed by GEHIRN, so some aspects of the organization must still be active. _They have probably gone even more underground than they were, would make sense given thei- our objective. The destruction of all anomalies and possible angelic objects. And now here I am at a new organization dedicated to killing things called Angels. If am going to figure this out I will probably have to do some digging on my new hosts, somebody is pulling some_ _ **very**_ _long strings from behind the scenes here._

"Too many variables." He muttered. Checking the clock he saw he had been brooding about his situation for several hours. His eyes widened it was 7:30am! He was going to be late for his first day of school! Not that he was looking forward to it nor did he need it but _when in Rome…_

He practically removed the front door from its hinges as he barreled onto the street and began to run at a pace that would tire most olympic runners after only a few hundred feet. Ignoring the marvels of engineering and architecture to his left and right he tore down the road and rammed through the door of the only relatively normal looking building on the street. Pausing in the lobby for all of a second to check which classroom he was in using the roster and resuming his furious pace down the hallway.

"Almost there!" He cried. He could see the door 10 feet, 6 feet, 2 feet… RINNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNG. He found himself collapsed on the remains of the door the edges still smoking from the friction against the frame as he had shoulder checked it.

"Right on time" He said, daring any one person to challenge his statement. The students just stared at him wide eyed and mouths slightly agape. Sighing loudly he walked over to where Shinji was sitting and sat down at the desk next to him dropping his bag at his feet. Turning his head revealed that he was just as surprised as the rest of the students if not more so.

Kane let out a low chuckle and opened up his assigned computer, his eyes narrowing as he noticed an email was already in his new inbox.

"Weird." He muttered under his breath. Before he could open the mysterious message a man that was at least 85 years old walked into the classroom, completely oblivious to the smouldering remains of what was once a door underneath his feet. Letting out a pent out breath Kane decided it would be best to let sleeping dogs lie, at least until he was somewhere more private. Closing his computer and and deciding that if he had been asleep for the past 20 years he might as well catch up on current events.

3 hours later Kane strode into the courtyard grateful for the break from the constant jabbering about second impact. It wasn't even anything he didn't already know, in fact the data he had gotten from the hard drives on Guam and the updates by GEHIRN had been more informative than this, detailing the actual damage to human civilization and not just the environment.

If he wanted details on who currently held power he was going to have to find out himself. The need to make use of potentially valuable time was starting to annoy him. His eyes scanned his surroundings switching from person to person rapidly looking for anyone that stood out. _Small school_ , He thought as he finished looking over the last person. "Guess I'll have to find something else to occupy my time." As he turned to walk off a flash of blue on white caught his eye. Turning his head towards the disturbance revealed a girl with almost no skin pigment, blue hair and, "Red eyes." He said in surprise. _But that would mean that…_ He walked over to her, eyes trailing over to the cast and eye patch. "Umm excuse me but do you work for NERV?" He asked.

"That is correct." She replied, barely a whisper,

"Are you a pilot?" His confidence growing in tandem with his suspicion.

"Yes" She said, in the same whisper as before.

"This will sound strange, but do you remember your early life? I mean who your parents were, maybe childhood friends." He elaborated, hoping for an answer different than what was expecting. The girls eyes became cloudy.

"I have no memory of any parents, commander Ikari raised me since before I was capable of memory. She said, just the slightest hint of confusion in her voice.

"I see" Kane said, his scowl deepening, stretching across his face like a snake. He turned and walked away heading towards the school, one word drifting around his head. _Augmented._

Shinji was moving with purpose, his objective clear. He wanted out of this place, not for the usual reasons that a kid wanted to ditch school either. He had always hated places that involved large quantities of people and was used to being tutored at home by his teacher.

Striding towards the exit his path was interrupted by the bathroom door opening up in front of him. Kane came striding out, nursing his left hand, upon noticing that Shinji was looking at him strangely he shoved it into the pocket of his cargo pants and gazed at the clock on the wall.

"Time to leave already?" He asked. Shinji was still gazing at Kane's pocket, his hand had looked like it was scratched up but there wasn't any blood. He wanted to ask if he had hurt himself but Kane's gaze told him to drop it.

"Uh, yeah it is." Kane said nothing as they exited the school and began the trek home.

"Shinji, do you know anything about that other pilot?"

"You mean Rei? No I don't she doesn't seem to get along well with the other students though." Shinji said with concern.

"Well you can say that about us too you know." Kane replied, admitting to their failure to find anybody to talk to on their first day. Shinji cracked a smile and they continued the trip in silence.

...

When they reached their destination an audible sawing noise was emanating from Misato's apartment.

"What on earth is that?" Shinji asked, concern evident.

"Let's find out, shall we." Kane said, as he pushed open the door. Standing there with a buzzsaw in hand was Misato looking proudly up at the hole she had put in the ceiling.

"OUR CEILING!"

"MY FLOOR!" They both wailed simultaneously.

"Until you..." She pointed at Kane, "learn how to wake up on time this hole will remain here."

"B-but HOW!"

"Woman's intuition" She said. "And security cameras." She added with a wink.

"I-I…" Kane hung his head in resignation, "Uhhhhhh, goddamn it, this is the last thing I need." He said, annoyance clear on his face as he hauled himself up into his apartment.

"Was this really necessary?" Shinji asked. Misato shook her head vigorously sending violet hair everywhere. Their conversation was interrupted by an excited scream from overhead.

"HELL YEAH! SHINJI GET UP HERE!"

"I swear we are never gonna get any sleep with that guy around." Misato said jokingly as she shook her head. To tell the truth she liked the American boy, his loud mouth behavior was enduring in a way and the effect he was having on Shinji was positive. After only a day of hanging around him Shinji had become visibly more relaxed. A far cry from the boy she had met only a day ago.

Shinji had just dragged himself up onto Kane's floor and was curiously looking around. Nothing had seemed out of the ordinary until he entered the room on the left of the hole revealing a large atrium that reminded him of one of those old dojo's he had seen in pictures. Standing in front of a wall of a wall absolutely _covered_ in weapons from every time period was Kane.

"Looks like section 2 came through for me, eh."

"I would call that an understatement." Shinji said. Kane merely laughed and walked over to the wall and selected a katana, Shinji noted that both of his hands looked fine as he recovered the weapon.

"Alright lesson one, catch this katana." He said as he flung it at Shinji, who in turn yelped and ducked. The sword bounced of the wall behind him and fell to the floor.

"Jesus! What the hell! That could have killed me!" He yelled.

"Well, if you consider plastic dangerous then I suppose it might have. Kane stated.

"Wait, what?"

"Come on Shinji you didn't think I would be that irresponsible, did you?" He asked laughing, "You are a beginner after all, these blades are plastic with an iron core, about the same weight as a real one."

"I-I..." Shinji stutered

"...am grateful that Kane is taking time out his day to train me?" Kane interjected as he looked his opponent over. _Think we'll have to start from the basics._ "Shinji, I want you to hit me as hard as you can."

"Wait, what!"

"You heard me, trust me I want to get a sense for how much you innately know."

"Uh, OK. Said Shinji, who dropped his book bag and tried to muster all of the force he could into a clumsy haymaker. Kane leaned back and let the fist pass in front of his face.

"First of all good try, you got the arm movement right, but you need to get the fundamentals first, bend your knees and space your feet about shoulder length apart… There! Now your getting it!"

The next day Kane found himself alone in his apartment slightly depressed. Reasoning that without the distraction of teaching Shinji his mind was forced to subconsciously focus on Rei and what she represented for him. Giving in and letting his thoughts shift over completely to the topic of the girl, he felt strange. She was obviously artificial from the ground up, the red eyes were a dead giveaway. That wasn't what was bothering him he conceded, but rather it was the fact that she seemed to have implanted memories. _Could that have happened to me._ He wondered as he wandered into the bathroom. Hand shaking he reached up to his face and placed a finger on his left eye, pulling it back took with it his single contact lens and revealing the source of his worry. For the most part there was nothing of note about the iris, however, in the top left corner of it was blood red. Steadying his breathing and placing the lens back in place he said,

"I chose this." Firmly with no room for debate. Looking back there should have been no reason for that micro freakout in the school bathroom, that concrete wall hadn't deserved what he had did to it. There shouldn't have ever have been a doubt in his mind GEHIRN were good people. _Weren't they?_ He struggled with his memories. His pondering interrupted by the doorbell.

Waking from his trancelike state and making his way to the door Kane once again was confronted with a new variable once he opened it. A man maybe in his late 20's was standing there. He was wearing a clean pressed suit that somehow came off as casual.

"Do I know you?" Kane asked coming off as a little hostile.

"Bad day?" The man asked unfazed, "And Yes, you should, I was the one that sent you that email that you didn't read" Pausing for a moment to admire the priceless look on Kane's face, he continued, "My name is Dan." Flashing two ID cards at once, one signifying he was a member of the US government. The other... Kane wasn't sure. It consisted of a golden disk, in the middle of that disk was a pyramid built of human skulls above the pyramid was an eagle with one obviously mechanical wing. "I work for an organization called the North American Terminus and operating under the authority of the US government. You will probably see me hanging around NERV the next couple of days so I figured that I would introduce myself. May I come in?"

Kane was suspicious but decided that there would be no harm in letting him in.

"You may" Together they sat down on opposite sides of the kitchen table.

"Just so you know you can speak freely, any bugs here have been running on a loop since I walked in."

"That's nice to know." Kane said. "If that's the case you wouldn't mind telling me what your doing here?"

"Of course kid, to put it simply N.A.T is the culmination of the merger of all major defense contractors in the US. We will be supplying you with any and all weaponry that you might need, both personal and Evangelion size. I am here to act as the liaison between you and us." Dan finished.

"OK, first question do you have a pamphlet or something for me to look at and secondly, how do you even exist?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"In the years following second impact the UN has taken control of everything, big business doesn't exist any more." Dan's eyes grew nebulous for a second before clearing up.

"That's right you have been asleep for years haven't you? To put it simply kid the UN has no bearing in North America. The US has cut ties with them and refused them access to their country. Canada is to cold for human life and when Mexico descended into anarchy N.A.T beat everyone to the punch and took over the top half of the country to use for manufacturing purposes and while nobody says it the N.A.T basically works for the US since they are the only ones the employ our services, the rest of the world has boycotted us." Kane was intrigued, while his wireless briefing had informed him of the USA's departure from the rest of the world and to act like he had no idea why he really just didn't know.

"But why cut ties with the UN." Kane asked.

Dan sighed he supposed that there was no harm in telling the kid he was technically a US citizen after all.

"Kane have you heard anything about the SCP foundation?" Dan asked darkly.

"Other than that they were responsible for that reptile incident, no." Kane answered.

"The foundation was or still is the single largest collector on anomalous objects, things that deviate from the norm of the universe, they can range from helpful to as bad as that lizard you fought and sometimes worse. At the dawn of second impact a good portion of these objects escaped and ran rampant. I won't go into details but suffice to say the United States got hit pretty hard. Everyday is a battle just to stay alive, the entire east coast is on fire and untold millions of creatures push against the lines every day. The government understandable doesn't want this threat to go global. Some terrorist could see these creatures as a way to get something they want if they knew that they existed. Thankfully the tainted sea is highly toxic and they have no way to cross it so it was decided that we would bear the burden alone. The entire country mobilized against them resulting in some sort of quasi fascist nation with the president as a general. Thankfully the people, or I suppose the soldiers, are ultimately in control, if the majority of them vote that he is unfit for duty then none of the machines that we build will submit to his authority and since we build 99% of the US's military equipment…"

"He'll have no power." Kane finished. "I have to admit it is a pretty smart system, probably a couple of flaws that need to be ironed out but it gets the job done I assume.

So why is the foundation allowed to exist if it was so damn reckless in the first place, there can't be any sense in allowing those things to continue existing why don't they destroy them or blast them into the sun if that's not possible?" Dan shrugged and explained,

"It is true that while knowledge of the foundation's existence may now be public they have done a damn good job covering their tracks and their motivation remains unknown. Although rumor has it that president Emmons is hunting them down one by one, destroying their facilities by sending in what remains of the SEAL battalions and killing everyone inside." shaking his head slowly he said, "enough with the conspiracy talk. I think it is time to get going. It was nice meeting you Kane. I'll leave you with this," he tossed an envelope onto the table, "come find me when you have made your choices." When the door was fully closed Kane sauntered over to his makeshift bed and collapsed under the weight of what he had learned. Opening the envelope he idly looked over the _**vast**_ array of weapons while thinking over what he had learned. _The SCP Foundation their goals would have put them at odds with GEHIRN they are probably the reason why I am hearing so little from HQ. No sense in worrying about it now though I am exactly where I need to be to counter the current threat guess all I can do is wait._ He managed to think before giving onto the warm embrace of sleep.

 **Somewhere underneath terminal Dogma**

"Ikari" Groaned the voice of Selee 1, "what do you make of this boy, the American."

"He is a non-factor, though it is true that he and the third child have formed a friendship I will adjust the scenario to ensure that both they are both in a aceptable state of mind by the time we are ready to initiate instrumentality."

"And how will you do this?" Asked Seele 3. "It is apparent that the fourth is considerably more mentally sound than the second or third."

"I'll ensure that he is beaten down both mentally and physically given enough time anybody will break." Commander Ikari said, pressing his glasses onto his face. "Perhaps you could be of assistance there, after all," he glanced over at two of the three inactive monoliths. "I have come to understand that certain inhibiting factors have become irrelevant." If the seven eyes on the monoliths could move they would be narrowed.

"Elaborate." Demanded Seele 2

"You have possession of several anomalous objects, making them available to me would greatly increase our chances of success."

The eyes seemed to narrow even more then opened wide in acceptance.

"Very well Ikari we will employ our objects but they will not be under your control, _we_ will decide where and when, is that understood?" Stated Seele 1

"Of course." The commander said.

"Before we end this meeting, l have seen fit to warn you of the danger that Evangelion poses, not the pilot. We want you to focus all assets on possible contingencies should an incident occur. We understand that your head scientist is have having trouble accessing it's greater functions. A key will be delivered to you shortly. In the meantime be vigilant, it is unknown at this time what it's motivations are but if initial scans are correct then it is likely extremely hostile, to a point where it may even exceed Unit 00's own anger." The commander just nodded his head. "This meeting is adjourned" Finished Seele 1.

…

In the elevator back to Central Dogma the commander thought about what the old men had said. _They are hiding something, something that has caused even more divisions within their ranks as evidenced by the absence of Seele 4. I wonder just how much this new Evangelion will change the scenario._

"Even worse than 00…" He mumbled to himself.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N Alright I wrote a good chink of this at 12:00 am, seemingly the only time I can focus on this sort of thing. Anyways point is be ready for a few mistakes and be sure to give some tips to how I can improve these fights, I really think I might be to analytical. Anyways enjoy the chapter!**

 **Edit- Added one or two sentences to the fight and elaborated on Kane's state of mind.**

* * *

Over the next week Kane's mood had improved greatly. Shinji, socially uninclined as he was had managed to make at least to friends at school, Toji and Kensuke if he remembered correctly. That much was enough to ease his nerves, a stress free teammate was less likely to get him killed he selfishly concluded. _On that note…_ He thought before being interrupted by the wail of klaxons.

"Time to go." He said, leaving his apartment.

* * *

After arriving at NERV and putting on his plugsuit Shinji got into Unit 01 and a hologram of Kane popped into the bottom right of the plug.

"Shinji are you…" His voice trailed off and was replaced by laughter. "HAHAHA. Is that your actual plug suit?" He asked almost in hysterics.

"Kane I-" He began, noting with horor that Kane's own suit was heavily armoured and padded in a way that looked far more appropriate for defending humanity.

"No, don't try to ruin this for me! You'll never be able to anyways." Kane was free floating in his LCL now, bumping into the sides of his plug at random intervals and laughing. Eventually with enough yelling on Misato's part he calmed down to the point where he could actually speak.

"Alright what are we looking at here?" He asked still snickering as he settled back into his acceleration couch.

"See for yourself." Misato said as an image of a creature sprang into view in their plugs, consuming their view. Jet black and almost as tall as Unit 01 it looked like it could take a beating judging by it's wide shoulders. The image zoomed in on the (relatively) little ball embedded in it's stomach.

"Remember guys, break the core kill the Angel." Mistato stated her voice brimming with confidence.

"Easier said than done." Kane muttered under his breath, "Shinji! watch out for those arms, don't approach it head on, leave that to me."

"Ok." Came his response, obviously not interested in getting grabbed by those arms as he watched a replay of one of them balloon to three times its size to stop an ICBM in its tracks. "Uh, Misato?"

"Yes Shinji?"

"How much force was behind that missile?" He asked as the massive weapon shredded itself upon the Angel's fingers.

"Only enough to send it into orbit before crashing down at mach 15." Misato stated casually.

"What my colleague meant to say was that the only reason it lasted as long as it has is because of it's AT field and since the Evas can nullify that you can damage it." Ritsuko chimed in, trying to reassure the nervous boy.

By this point the Angel was well inside the city and the ground was starting to shake as it tore up massive chunks of pavement merely by staring at it, presumably trying to get to the chewy inside of of it's hard shelled target. There was no time left.

"Evas launch!"

* * *

As soon as Nox stepped of the launch pad Kane knew something was wrong, very wrong. Nox was far too heavy, he couldn't move any of it's joints and he fell into a kneeling position crushing several nearby cars.

"What the hell is going on!" He shouted.

" **LOW POWER."** Answered the masculine voice of the onboard computer.

"Fuck! Did you guys catch that?"

"We're working on it now." The calm voice of doctor Akagi confirmed. "The N2 reactor isn't routing enough power to Nox, it could take up to a minute to correct the issue."

"I don't have a second! Shinji! Can you hear me?"

"Won't do any good." Akagai warned him,"We are only talking through the physical connection.

"Fuck!"

* * *

Shinji was getting scared. Nox hadn't gotten up yet and Misato had warned him he was on his own until they could correct the power issue. The titanic Angel spared Nox a brief look then, it turned it's blank face towards Unit 01.

"Ok Shinji, remember what Kane told you, stick to the sides, avoid it's arms." Misato reassured him, worry leaking through her calm demeanor. Shinji remained quite, paralyzed with fear. The beast lumbered forward, arm extended, it's goal obvious. Only a few feet away Shinji's survival instincts took over. Dodging under the arm and behind the Angel. He attempted one of the moves Kane had shown him during training, a full nelson he had called it. After locking both of the Angel's arms in place he tried something else. Kicking in the back of it's kneecap causing it to crumble to the ground. Vaguely registering the cacophony of cheers Misato and the bridge crew were giving him Shinji reared his arm back for what would have been a devastating back of the head punch had it not been for a lance of light erupting from the Angels elbow striking him dead in the eye and blinding him.

"AAAAGGGGHHHH." He screamed rearing back.

"Shinji!" Misato yelled in panic. The Angel lunged trying to grab Unit 01's face. Thankfully, it undershot and in a bid to delay it even longer Shinji brought Unit 01s fist down on the back of the Angels "head" causing it to tumble to the ground, indenting the pavement. Shinji relaxed for a second as the Angel pushed itself of the ground but before he could comprehend what had happened the monster shot it's arm out closing it's hand around his ankle. The muscles ballooned up and crushed the bone and the pilot screamed. As gravity took effect and Unit 01 fell the Angel stood up and grabbed it by it's legs hoisting the machine above its head and bringing it down onto the unforgiving pavement below, it did this again and again trying to shatter the bioweapon's spine, Misato was screaming into the plug over the radio trying to wake up the now most likely unconscious Shinji.

* * *

"Doc what's the status on that fix!" Kane shouted desperately. It was maddening being stuck in the steel box as his friend was dying.

"Just a little… There! Go!" Nox took off like a rocket indenting the ground as it ran. The Angel turned it's head towards him and raised it's hand launching a lance towards him.

Seconds before the lance extended Kane felt something _break_ inside him, this… this _thing_ had tried to hurt him but more importantly... his friend, _**Euclid Status Engaged.**_ Kane didn't slow down or try to dodge under it, instead he met it head on the lance impacting his machine where it's heart would be. The lance sunk in maybe a millimeter before stopping, laughing like a lunatic Kane pressed forwards,

"Try all you like! That's six inches of carbyne!" He screamed as he slowly pushed forward, eager to avenge his friend. The Angel stared at him quizzically and he felt the pain in his chest grow as he continued. _But that doesn't matter does it!_ he thought as he gripped the lance squeezing it until it shattered, the entire lance disintegrated, chain exploding from the break to the orifice it had emerged from and knocking the Angel back. _So this is what it feels like!_ Kane thought with elation as he sprinted forwards closing the distance. _No Plan! No Strategy! Just Killing, Killing, Killing the Bastard That Wants Me, no! HUMANITY…_ "DEAD!"

Reaching out with his left arm through the AT field intent on tearing the creatures face off, Kane acnolaged a voice ringing throughout the plug,

"The core! The core!" Misato yelled. _WHO CARES._ Kane thought as he pressed onwards. By now the pain in his chest had grown to rib breaking levels. Finally the clawed hand grasped the bird like mask and tore it forward. To Kane's surprise the entire Angel was pulled forwards instead of the mask and the whole creature fell. In the back of his head he thought he felt _something_ clawing at the back of his skull something foreign… but not unfamiliar. It wanted, no, was begging him! To fully discard his humanity and tear the thing under his boot to pieces, to lay into it with tooth and claw, to leave nothing behind but a bloody smear on the pavement. Instead, Kane didn't know why, he lifted his foot up and brought down the full 15,000 tonnes, even more with the aid of the Higgs field, of Nox's body. At the same time he concentrated the small amount of AT field he could muster into same foot. The result was a foot sized hole through the Angel's torso.

Kane would done it again but he had cracked the core which was now glowing a dangerous pink. _Oh shit! I have got to get rid of this thing!_ Kane thought as he failed to heft the titanic body above his head, whatever that rush had been it was gone now. Then he felt that thing in the back of his head seem to grow angry at his lack of commitment and with that his rage returned. The Eva's jaw snapped open revealing brilliantly white serrated teeth large enough to crush cars. Suddenly he felt himself almost effortlessly lift the giant body and fling it into the air.

"KANE DON"T!" He heard Ritsuko cry. But the massive creature was already sailing into the air above the city.

"Raise blast shields 79 through 81!" The doctor ordered the techs. Only seconds after the shields were raised protecting both Nox and Unit 01 did the Angel implode a hundred feet over the city with the force of a N2 mine sending a shockwave out of the epicenter that destroyed everything in its path, shattering windows and tipping skyscrapers.

When the dust cleared only Nox was still standing supporting the frame of Unit 01, a bloody tar like substance oozing from the cracks in it's armour.

* * *

Inside the bridge everyone's ears were ringing.

"Ritsuko! What the hell was that?" Asked Mistato slightly louder than necessary due to her ringing ears.

"An Airburst, slinging it into the air like that turned the Angel into a fuel air bomb, if he had let it detonate on the ground then the pressure wave would have been absorbed by the earth."

"But he saved us right? The geofront would have collapsed if that had detonated so close to the ground."

"Maybe but terminal Dogma would have survived and us along with it." On that note Ritsuko left Misato to contemplate the full implications for what that would have meant for the people in the hanging structures. She did always hate being the logical one.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N-Long time no see. Sorry that this chapter took so long it was supposed to be longer but I figured I should get something out just to show that I am trying. Hopefully this will shed some light on Kane's past, after the next chapter I will try to obscure the plot some more and spread out the narrative more evenly, the last thing I want to do is burn through all of my ideas in the first few chapters. But just for reference we have SCP 2440 actively trying to gain a foothold (The power dump into 682). Unease in the top levels of the foundation to the point of multiple parts of the organization breaking off and trying to undermine them from both the inside and out. (O5-4 and the missing monoliths). The USA is tied down fighting a secret war against uncountable hoards of the undead and is working with O5-4 to cripple the foundation through spec ops strikes. They are also being supplied by a national megacorporation that may or may not be run by the Illuminati. All the while Kane is struggling with who to trust and if his memories are even his.**

 **I think that covers all of it. Moving on the the actual story I have some music for you guys! For the first part I wanted something sad and I settled on this one...**

* * *

 **Opeth Still Day Beneath the Sun**

* * *

Kane was cold. So cold in fact, that it took him a while to realise where he was. He couldn't see but he could feel. He was in a liquid but he was breathing freely. LCL? The thick liquid surrounded him at every angle, seeping into his pours and sucking out what little heat he had left.

He felt _wrong_ something very bad had just happened, why couldn't he remember. He began to grow panicked, taking the red liquid into his lungs faster and faster as the question swirled in his head. _Where was he? What happened? Where were his comrades… his brothers!?_

"Comence memetic control test #1. Keter Level."

A visage revealed itself to him, long gangly arms ending in grossly long fingers stained in blood. Tall, taller than the tallest man he had ever seen. It's skin was disgustingly pale and it's mouth was the worst of all, wide enough to fit his head whole and lined with thousands of tiny teeth. He watched it run at him faster than any living thing should have been able to. He tried to move but he couldn't, he was rooted to the ground in fear. The thing leaped at him. That's it, he was dead, there wasn't a thing he could do, that thing was going to tear him in half and rip out his organs. He thought, oddly disconnected.

He closed his eyes and… Nothing happened, it had passed through him but there was screaming from behind him. Against his instincts he turned around. The sight that greeted him was horrendous. His brothers fought with everything they had, emptying entire clips into the monster but it wasn't enough. Chunks of flesh were blasted off as superheated plasma boiled blood and caused flesh to explode. Sometimes they would sacrifice themselves, pulling the pins on their grenades to buy a brother a little extra time. But no matter what they did the skeleton always remained the flesh always came back. Soon there was nothing left. The concrete walls were _painted_ in their blood.

He wanted to move but couldn't, now it wasn't a problem of fear, he wanted to move but he was physically rooted into place. Suddenly a overwhelming pain enveloped his chest. Kane gazed down to see his chest tearing open like paper. Screaming in agony Kane fell to his knees as his lungs fell out of his ribcage. The last thing he saw before blacking out was that the organs were still going steady, pumping oxygen into his bloodstream.

When Kane's eyes opened again he felt a deathly calm overtake him a single thought overtook him. Kill them. He felt no anger, no confusion, no fear. Just the urge to end it as quickly and effectively as possible. The were still out there, the people. Scurrying around, pouring over incoming data. He could see them through the glass wall of his capsule. It wouldn't be enough to stop him. He raised one fist up and slammed it against the glass. It cracked a bit. Kane dimly noted that the blow had been far stronger than any he had ever thrown, even though he was hindered by his awkward positioning inside the capsule. A few researchers saw this and backed away. He struck the glass again, the crack widened. Guards were pouring into the room now readying their rifles.

 _Reboot complete. Strength at maximum._

He kicked off the back of the pod, exploding out of the pod and onto the nearest guard. Grabbing the man's gun and twisting it sideways so that it pressed horizontally against against his chest. Kane shoved forward crushing his ribs against the wall. The bloody gurgle of death and punctured lungs escaped the guard's bloodstained mask. Tearing the dead man's sidearm from it's holster he spun around and shot two more through the head, their brains exploding out the back of their heads, one left. He pulled the trigger… jammed. His enemy had finally recovered from his stupor and unleashed a torrent of fire from his submachine gun. The bullets tore across the right side of Kane's body. The ones nearest to the his vitals were stopped by thicker skin, a few however, ripped through his shoulder and out the other side splattering the walls with a black tar like substance, his blood. In retribution Kane flung the sidearm with his good hand. When the weapon impacted the guard's head it was met with the sickening crunch of the composite helmet and bone.

Recovering from his follow through, Kane took stock of his situation. The researchers had escaped out the door. While he was tempted to pursue them his priorities had changed with his arm being in the shape that it was, he could cauterize it but that could leave permanent damage. No… instead he would find the head of the beast and decapitate it. That would buy him enough time to regenerate and hunt down the rest.

He had put on the dead men's armour and had taken their weapons, more primitive than what he was used to, simple chemical based projectiles, these were after all mere guards soon more would arrive with more advanced weaponry.

He could hear them now, setting up barricade after barricade right outside the room, he needed to move.

* * *

The site director sat camly inside his office staring at the red phone on his desk. The fighting had grown closer over the last few hours and was now just outside. They just didn't have enough firepower to stop the subject, it tore through the site guards with practiced ease slowly pushing it's way to the director's office. He switched his gaze over to the monitor live streaming the carnage. He had really thought that they would have been able to handle the situation. He was a fool, they had managed to barricade the hallway with 16 armed guards, a HMG sat at the end of the hall facing the door. Suddenly the lights went out and the hall filled with smoke. It was only later that they realized it had crawled into the maintenance shaft and torn out the fuses. Then it must have pulled the pins on the smoke grenades it had recovered from the bodies of the previous guards. Smoke poured from the vents filling the hallway.

It got difficult to tell what happened next, even though the camera had thermal. All the director could see was a blurry shape emerge from the vent in the middle of the hallway crushing the guard underneath. What was scary wasn't the near instant death of guard below, they had known that it was strong, but that the shape wasn't identifiable by how hot it was but rather how it was colder than the ambient air around it. The blue blob crept up the hallway slowly, silencing any guards that got in it's way. All this took about a minute until it reached the HMG where it leapt out of the smoke and killed the guard by driving it's fist through the guard's heart. Then somehow seeing through the thick smoke it turned the HMG on the remaining guards. All in all it had killed 20 guards a fifth of this site's security. Nothing they threw at it could stop it, there just wasn't enough time to consolidate more guards and overwhelm it.

His phone rang.

"We're here. Open the door."

The director smiled, Nine Tailed Fox had arrived.

* * *

 **Berserk OST Hundred Years War**

* * *

Kane dropped the corpse of the guard whose neck he had broken letting it fall to the ground. One room left, then he could kill the director and force a lockdown giving him enough time to hunt down the last of the staff. Gazing back he took in the destruction he had wrought. Bodies everywhere. The lucky ones had been killed from afar, the ones he got close to usually met a slower death.

Turning back to the last door between him and the office he readied himself. Hefting the mag shield into place so that it was covering most of his body, he checked the auto shotgun in the hand that had healed, it wasn't 100% yet but he could hold a gun. He didn't know what model it was, it was unmarked, but he had taken a liking to it. Thanks to it's deep magazine and stopping power.

He wouldn't be able to use the vents, those had been filled with halogen gas the moment the security had gotten their rebreathers on. Not that he couldn't filter it out but it became impossible to see when the gas was in such large concentrations and his thermal didn't work through walls.

 _3…_

 _2…_

 _1…_

Inside the room the door exploded inwards, the faceless security opened fire, the glass optics on their masks alight with flame. Soon the doorway was entirely clouded in smoke.

"CEASE FIRE!" Roared the commander. Suddenly an audible "tink" "tink" sound was heard as a tiny cylinder bounced out of the smoke.

"FLASHBA…" BOOM! The room went alight with blinding white light.

Kane moved like a bullet, rushing out of the smoke like some sort of demon. The shield was growing painful to hold now, it was starting to overheat from all of the damage it had absorbed, he ignored it. Raising his shotgun he cut down those that had not been able to get behind their barricades in time. He lept the closest barricade kicking the guard behind it as he landed, breaking his neck. Now the effects of the grenade wore off and the others were rapidly recovering. He prioritized The ones who had stood up to shoot him first but soon the rest would realize were he was and overload the shield through brute force. He opted to vault back over the barcade so that there was something more substantial between him and the impending wall of bullets. Sure enough he took at least three bullets to the back as he vaulted to safety. Kane suppressed a grunt of pain. They had switched their magazines to armour piercing. These ones had gone deep. He could feel the black blood trickle down his back and onto the floor.

 _Warning, minor damage to spine detected. Movement compromised._

Pulling his remaining grenades from his belt Kane took stock. Three left, all frags. Kane pulled the pins on all three and tossed the whole belt over the barricade. A massive explosion emanated from the other side of the barricade. Kane had timed it so that the grenades would explode in mid air. The shrapnel, if it didn't flat out kill, them shredded the guards protective gear, exposing them to the deadly gas. Not even Kane had gone unscathed behind the safety of his barrier, he was lacerated in several areas, his armour shredded. He could hear them behind the barrier now, gasping for air choking on the gas. Kane got the feeling he was inflicting revenge in some sort of roundabout way. Karma was bitch. A tiny smile spread across his face as the crimson red in his left iris grew a little, erasing the light hazel that was its predecessor.

He rose up and noticed that there was one guard left, miracuously untouched by the shrapnel. Kane crossed the distance as fast as his damaged spine would permit, a fast limp. He must have looked like a monster, his armour torn and leaking black blood, shambling through the pale yellow gas towards a man whose comrades were still suffocating, their cries of agony and fear muffled by the damaged rebreathers. The man fell back now and emptied an entire clip from his sidearm but his arms, shaking with fear, did not allow the bullets to hit their mark. Tears streamed down his face now as "it" continued forward, undaunted.

"I DON'T WANT TO DI….." His scream was cut short by the sound of a shell case hitting the ground with a soft " _tink."_ Kane turned towards the office door, it was time to finish this. But before he could take another step an intense burning sensation engulfed his kneecaps and he fell to the ground. He knew the feeling well, cold plasma. Nine Tailed fox had arrived.


	8. Chapter 8

Kane dropped the corpse of the guard whose neck he had broken letting it fall to the ground. One. Room. Left. Then he could kill the director and force a lock down giving him enough time to hunt down the last of the staff. Gazing back he took in the destruction he had wrought. Bodies everywhere. The lucky ones had been killed from afar, the ones he got close to usually met a slower death.

Turning back to the last door between him and the office he readied himself. Hefting the mag shield into place so that it was covering most of his body, he checked the auto shotgun in the hand that had healed, it wasn't 100% yet but he could hold a gun. He didn't know what model it was, it was unmarked, but he had taken a liking to it. Thanks to it's deep magazine and stopping power.

He wouldn't be able to use the vents, those had been filled with halogen gas the moment the security had gotten their rebreathers on. Not that he couldn't filter it out but it became impossible to see when the gas was in such large concentrations and his thermal didn't work through walls.

 _3…_

 _2…_

 _1…_

Inside the room the door exploded inwards, the faceless security opened fire, the glass optics on their masks alight with flame. Soon the doorway was entirely clouded in smoke.

"CEASE FIRE!" Roared the commander. Suddenly an audible "tink" "tink" sound was heard as a tiny cylinder bounced out of the smoke.

"FLASHBA…" BOOM! The room went alight with blinding white light.

Kane moved like a bullet, rushing out of the smoke like some sort of demon. The shield was growing painful to hold now, it was starting to overheat from all of the damage it had absorbed, he ignored it. Raising his shotgun he cut down those that had not been able to get behind their barricades in time. He lept the closest barricade kicking the guard behind it as he landed, breaking his neck. Now the effects of the grenade wore off and the others were rapidly recovering. He prioritized The ones who had stood up to shoot him first but soon the rest would realize were he was and overload the shield through brute force. He opted to vault back over the barcade so that there was something more substantial between him and the impending wall of bullets. Sure enough he took at least three bullets to the back as he vaulted to safety. Kane suppressed a grunt of pain. They had switched their magazines to armour piercing. These ones had gone deep. He could feel the black blood trickle down his back and onto the floor.

 _Warning, minor damage to spine detected. Movement compromised._

Pulling his remaining grenades from his belt Kane took stock. Three left, all frags. Kane pulled the pins on all three and tossed the whole belt over the barricade. A massive explosion emanated from the other side of the barricade. Kane had timed it so that the grenades would explode in mid air. The shrapnel, if it didn't flat out kill, them shredded the guards protective gear, exposing them to the deadly gas. Not even Kane had gone unscathed behind the safety of his barrier, he was lacerated in several areas, his armour shredded. He could hear them behind the barrier now, gasping for air choking on the gas. Kane got the feeling he was inflicting revenge in some sort of roundabout way. Karma was bitch. A tiny smile spread across his face as the crimson red in his left iris grew a little, erasing the light hazel that was its predecessor.

He rose up and noticed that there was one guard left, miracuously untouched by the shrapnel. Kane crossed the distance as fast as his damaged spine would permit, a fast limp. He must have looked like a monster, his armour torn and leaking black blood, shambling through the pale yellow gas towards a man whose comrades were still suffocating, their cries of agony and fear muffled by the damaged rebreathers. The man fell back now and emptied an entire clip from his sidearm but his arms, shaking with fear, did not allow the bullets to hit their mark. Tears streamed down his face now as "it" continued forward, undaunted.

"I DON'T WANT TO DI….." His scream was cut short by the sound of a shell case hitting the ground with a soft " _tink."_ Kane turned towards the office door, it was time to finish this. But before he could take another step an intense burning sensation engulfed his kneecaps and he fell to the ground. He knew the feeling well, cold plasma. Nine Tailed fox had arrived.

He struggled to keep himself supported on the chard husks that were his knee caps. The flesh had been burned away completely leaving soot covered actuators and metal. The pain was truly incredible, he had been shot with plasma before but never in the joints. His knees burned with the ferocity of Hades and it felt like a river of fire was snaking it's way up his legs and into his chest. He couldn't stop now! Not when he was so close! _Victory at any cost. Victory at any cost. Victory at any cost._ He told himself again and again like a mantra, his emotionless composure coming back to him. Nine Tailed Fox had surrounded him in a semicircle. One to his left, right and behind him, another at the door calling for reinforcements. Biting down the pain he forced himself to think. If the others arrived and he wasn't gone that would be the end. He would be destroyed and written off as a failure.

So he searched for a way, calmly, methodically plotting out the deaths of every enemy in the room. Though he was grimacing in pain his eyes betrayed a look similar to that of a bullet bearing down on a enemy and as he plotted his wounds grew less and less severe. In 15 seconds his spinal cord would be totally healed his knees would take far longer but at least he would be able to move properly after all, the plasma hadn't damaged the joints at all, just the flesh.

Seconds pass, the pain is at a point to where he can manage it now. Shock was hard, chronic was easy. Now is the time to move. Kane throws himself towards his dropped mag shield, rolling to a stop with it firmly in his grip, steam from the overloaded capacitors burning his hands. The group level their rifles at him in warning. _They must want me alive._ A grin stretches across his face, teeth visible. _ALL THE EASIER!_ He thought as he flung his only defense at them. The MTF fired, exactly as he planned. The shield already hovering on the edge of exploding couldn't handle the extreme thermal energy and exploded in the middle of the three knocking them aside. Kane for his part was grazed across the head, burning off his ear but he was too focused to notice. He dove for one of the rifles and managed to kill the one by the door before sprinting out into the maze of hallways the was the research site.

"You heard me. The director ordered over the phone."

"Sir, are you certain?"

"Captain, I need not inform you of what would happen if that monster where to find the the shelters."

"Which one?" Chuckled the captain morbidly, referencing the animal that he was about to unleash.

"Enough! You have your orders. Now follow them." The director commanded hanging up the phone.

The captain put down the radio and prepared to input the code that would open the large metal box next to him, his hand hovering over the keypad, hesitating… then he input the code and stepped back, quickly.

The box opened with a pneumatic hiss, the 1 ton door pushed aside effortlessly by what lay inside…

…..

 _3...2...1… pull._ Kane grimaced in pain as he tightened the bandages around his knee, he had to stop the bleeding, it was leaving a trail. He was still being tracked by the MTF and unlike the normal guards he couldn't act recklessly around plasma based weaponry. He could have easily have been killed back there if those troops hadn't set their weapons to cold.

He had another problem too. All of the pain he was going through was subconsciously triggering his Euclid state. He could repress it for a little while but it was still there **scratching** at the inside of his head. Begging him to rush to the main office and end the life waiting inside…

He took a breath. He couldn't afford to be so reckless! He stood up and robotically slammed his fist into the side of his head in a useless bid to drown out the sound of his own thoughts. Looking out through the keyhole of the storage closet he was in he saw it was clear and stepped out. Making almost no sound he took off down the hallway sticking close to large pockets of yellowish gas ensuring he was near invisible. He moved at random, trying to establish a greater lead over his pursuers.

"Over here!"

They had found him. Taking an immediate left he found himself against a dead end. Turning around Kane expected anything from a flurry of plasma to a flashbang to be flying at him. What he did not expect was for a six foot blur of muscle to slam into him at bone shatting speeds and carry him through the wall. His opponent stopped after he had shoved Kane through the wall. Kane on the other hand, kept going, sailing through the air. Kane backflipped and managed to slam his hand into the ground, digging a trench and letting sparks fly as the flesh on his fingers was stripped off the metal. Mechanically Kane pushed himself to his feet and observed his surroundings and opponent. They were in the mess hall, the tables had all been pushed to the sides leaving a wide open arena. Now he turned to his opponent. He was lean and had a olive tone to his skin he wore a ragged black cloak over his heavily tattooed chest. His pants were as black as his cloak and baggy so they wouldn't constrict movement. The tattoos depicted a mix of random patterns and demonic faces that seemed to peer out off the cracked walls of a fallen castle. What was most striking was his teeth, sharp and pointed they stretched across his face in a leering grin.

"What are you?" Kane asked keeping his voice low.

"So it speaks! I was hoping to hear you scream while I break your back." His voice carried a measure of uncontained glee

"You didn't answer my question."

"Heh. I suppose I am just like you, a pet project of this despicable foundation." He said pulling the collar of his cloak down to reveal a heavy metal choker. " They call me SCP 76-2 but..." Before the SCP could finish his monologue Kane charged, putting all of his force into one punch. The SCP caught it. "You can call me Abel." he said excitement boiling over, painfully squeezing Kane's hand, disjointing the fingers before Kane could wretch it away.

Now it was Abel's turn to charge, unleashing a vicious uppercut. Kane leaned backwards to avoid the fist but choked out a gasp of pain when his skin split from is stomach to his chest leaving a gash in his armour that leaked black blood. Abel had pulled a pitch black sword from the folds of his cloak and casually rested it over his shoulder as Kane staggered backwards.

"Is this really all you have to offer." His smile was gone now the excitement had been replaced with resentment. "The way the O5 talked about you led me to believe that this would be fun."

Kane was on his back breathing heavily he could tell that he didn't have any longer in this state of consciousness. Euclid priorities would take over now, that was a certainty, his vision was going black, blacker, nothingness… then, giggling, it wasn't loud or demonic it was in fact, the opposite, quiet and soft, like something a child might do and Kane just lay there laughing softly to himself a trickle of tar like blood ran out of his mouth and down his chin.

"So tell me Abel…" Kane spat out the name mockingly. " How much explosive is in that dog collar of yours?" Able looked on, pleasantly surprised at the boy's change in tone.

"About 40 pounds of C4. Why do you ask?" Kane stood up dropping his weapons and tearing off his shredded armour, exposing his chest, the flesh was burned away in some places revealing the silvery glint of metal underneath.

"I just want to know how much force I'll need to apply to remove your head. That's all." Kane's giggling had grown incessant now morphing into a mocking sneer as he reset the joints in his fingers, each one popping into place with a nauseating " _crunch."_

Abel paid more attention now. All the robotic stiffness had left his mechanical opponent leaving behind a relaxed and natural looking predator. Abel's smile returned in full now, maybe this boy would be able to give him the fight he was looking for after all.

"Alright, I'll indulge you. You say you'll rip off my head. How much force will I need to apply to crush your heart?"

"To get through my rib cage? You'd need to apply over 250,000 pounds." Kane replied, fully aware that the being in front of him was capable of that and more.

"I've torn through enough blast doors to know what I am capable of. I accept your challenge." Nothing more was said, the two merely looked at each other for a second before charging. Where their feet met the ground concrete caved and shattered and when their fists made contact with each others faces it was as if the gods themselves roared their approval at the gladiatorial showdown. Abel's jaw had been torn off completely, sent flying across the room and Kane's eye had literally been knocked out in addition to that most of his teeth were broken as well, the enamel chipped off to reveal crystalline fangs. Abel was the first to recover from the blow and pulled a massive warhammer from his cloak and spun around to strike Kane in the knees causing him to fall to the ground. Abel lifted the hammer and brought it down in a murderous arc aimed at Kane's head. Kane rolled to the side and let the hammer devastate the ground next to him before grabbing the handle and using it as leverage to swing his legs underneath Abel's stealing his balance to send him to the ground before pulling himself up into the air and back down onto the fallen Able putting his fist through his chest. Able simply materialized a knife and expertly slid it in between Kanes elbow joint before kicking the boy off of him and into the ceiling above. Kane's arm didn't go with him. Able stood up Kane's arm still embedded in his chest and pulled a spear from his cloak and let it fly. At the same time Kane kicked off the ceiling where he was imbedded and came flying down screaming like a rabid animal, any semblance of humanity gone, his remaining eye had gone totally blood red. The spear, less of a normal weapon and more like a whaling harpoon, met the top of Kane's sternum in a truly destructive case of an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object. The spear tore through the rib cage and out the other side and when Kane's body hit the ground it was limp and lifeless.

Abel stepped forward to finish it but a warning beep sounded from his collar. Abel stopped seemed to think for a moment before jumping forwards in an attempt to end it. But before he could so much as materialize a weapon his head exploded in a massive fireball that engulfed the entire room and when the smoke clears only ashes remain.

…

"Jesus what a shitshow."

"I know right I have only ever seen him act that aggressive when we introduced him to his brother and the end result was almost exactly the same, a completely destroyed facility." The men looked on as the remains of their boss's little venture into genetic splicing and cybernetics was loaded into a cryo tank. 76's body had already decomposed to nothing.

"Well to be fair this is practically his brother. What do you think they'll do with him?" The other one said.

"I imagine they'll repair him after his memory is wiped. Then they will most likely lock him away where no one will find him."

"I suppose you're probably right, it is in the name after all 'Secure Contain Protect.'"


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N- One day Late as usual. Let's begin shall we! From here on out the story will 'normalize' at least for a little while and for the time being I'll be steering away from the clandestine. I know that I said that this one would focus on Rei but I honestly thought that it would just make more sense to get a good look at Shinji after a battle. Plus this was also a good opportunity to develop Misato's character, both as a commander and as a mother figure to Shinji.**

 **As stated I went back to chapter 2 and retconned a bunch of stuff said by O5-4 about Kane's pseudo personalities. All I did was make it far more fluid and give me a little more wiggle room in terms of what I had to work with. This is something I will (hopefully) avoid in the future.**

 **Now for a response.**

 **Volbia- I can see where you are coming from with your complaint about the recent focus on Kane but, really... it was a lot of writing and I wasn't about to leave his origin story half finished while I went and did something else for a chapter. That being said I do recognize that I need to pay attention to everyone and develop them accordingly. Remember what I said though, my stated goal for this fic is to focus more on the world as a whole then the individual characters, everybody will play their part and Kane is currently serving as my best connection to the foundation and what they had been doing in the years before and after second impact. So I do hope that you will continue to read and enjoy. Remember everybody will get their time in the spotlight it just (at least to me) makes sense that the beginning of the story (we are not very far in) should focus on establishing the original character that's all.**

"So did you get anything on him?" Miasto asked Ritsuko. They were seated in her office looking over the recordings from the battle.

"Alot." She confirmed. "Those access codes he gave me were helpful for sure. Take a look at this." She said as she pulled up his psychograph revealing he had been awake the whole fight. Misato was stunned.

"How is this even possible?" She asked the scientist. Ritsuko paused for a moment and answered.

"It has long been thought that a synch rate above 100% is impossible without the Evangelion going berserk and the pilot going unconscious, and yet, this data shows that not only was he conscious but that he achieved a synch rate 105% and look at this." She said as she overlapped Kane's psychograph with that of his Eva's. They matched **perfectly.**

"He was in control the whole time." Misato whispered in awe. "A controlled berserker."

"That's right, and just look at it!" She gestured towards the image of Nox tanking the third Angel's desperate blows as it reached through the AT field grasping at the bird like mask. "All of this is made possible by that Higgs field." Ritsuko said, pointing out where the tips of the clawed hand and elbow joint glowing with white hot flame. "The flames are just a byproduct of the friction in between the molecules when he distorts the field. There is so much heat being generated that those white lines across the exterior are actually plasma heatsinks."

"You don't mean the same type that go on an N2 reactor do you?" Misato said, shocked.

"I do."

"Jesus. Do we have anything that can restrain it, in a worse case scenario?"

"Not really, but those pylons of it seem to be made for that purpose. At the touch of a button I can magnetically lock them together as pseudo handcuffs."

"It will have to do for now, but keep digging, there is no telling how much damage that thing could do if we lose control entirely." Misato said as she stood poised to leave the room.

Upon entering the hallway she found Rei just standing there.

"Oh! Hi there Rei… do you need something?" She added the last part tenitavely realising that it could come off as her trying to get rid of the girl as fast as possible, but it was unusual for Rei to ever be somewhere without a very good reason. A fact she had learned very early after being introduced.

"I have come to ask about Nox. Do you have any information about why it acted the way it did?" The reply was as simple and blunt as she expected.

"Well… to be honest, we know as little as ever other than that it is strangely cooperative with it's pilot, if a little pushy." Rei's red eyes seemed to go glassy for a split second, as if putting two and two together.

"I see, perhaps I will visit pilot Rayner to check his condition."

"That's a nice thing to do Rei, I was just about to check on Shinji myself…" Before she could finish Rei had already began walking towards the med wing. Misato just shrugged her shoulders and followed her.

* * *

Misato slowly opened the door to the room Shinji was being held in. What she saw was what she had expected. The kid was sitting up in bed, staring dejectedly down at a tray of hospital food. When he looked up and saw her his eyes seemed to brighten, if only a little.

"Hey kiddo, how are you holding up?"

"Better than I thought I would." He answered, unconsciously rubbing the eye he had felt the Angel pierce. "It's fault that so much of the city was destroyed, isn't it?" He looked up at her shamefully. "I told you I wasn't qualified! That I wasn't read…" His tirade was silenced by a firm hug.

"You did all you could." She told him firmly. It was our fault that Nox didn't get the power it needed. If you and Kane had fought it together then none of this would have happened."

"I was so scared. I don't want to pilot it any more" He whimpered into her shoulder, any vestige of confidence he had shown over the past week gone.

"I know. I'm sorry if we, if _I_ had been ready then maybe NERV could have covered some sort of tactical retreat until Nox came online and I promise you, you will _never_ fight alone again. From now on you will have all the support I can give you." She told him with her hands on his shoulders. "That and that walking skyscraper Kane calls an Eva." She added with a hint of a smile.

"Do you promise?" He asked quietly, his eyes downcast.

"Of course." She smiled.

Shinji took a deep breath and seemed to collect himself before replying.

"Alright, If you guarantee that I'll never have to get into one of those things against my will then I'll pilot.

"Shinji, I would never ever make you pilot against your will." She told him in the most serious tone possible.

"Thank you." He said pulling away from her grip. He shouldn't have been surprised, this was the woman who had let him stay in her apartment no questions asked and had treated him to all the comforts of a home, even if it was a little messy and had a penguin wandering around.

He once again became more solemn as his mind turned to the question that had haunted him from the moment he had woken up.

"How many…"

"None." Misato cut him off immediately.

"How?! The blast took out one and a half square miles!"

"I don't know the exact science but from what I gathered everyone was underground when Kane lost it. He must have known this and flung the bastard into the air before it exploded. Ritsuko tells me that if it had detonated at ground level then at least 1,800 people would have died in the ensuing collapse of the tower directly underneath. In exchange the explosion caused a wave of overpressure that knocked over the buildings above ground and caused significant damage to the vascular systems of both Evangelions, particularly to Unit 01." She finished. Shinji had listened intently and his mood had improved significantly upon hearing that nobody had died but he got the feeling that Misato was intentionally leaving something out, something that was bothering her.

"There is something else isn't there?" He asked nervously. Misato looked uncomfortable for a moment and looked like she wasn't going to say anything but decided then that she shouldn't hold back the information. Sighing she began.

"The higher ups are pissed, they say that if Kane had just let the Angel detonate at ground level then the damage to the city would have been minimized and would have cost far less to repair as opposed to just one of the hanging towers... Honestly, nothing will come off it but it is just sad the way they act, that's all."

"Oh." Was all Shinji had managed, he had once again disappointed his father. Misato tried her best to reassure him.

"Don't listen to anything those bureaucrats say Shinji all they care about is paperwork and money, what you two did was heroic. Now come on I'll drive us home and when Kane is discharged in a few hours we'll all have a nice victory dinner. What do you say!" Shinji just nodded his head dumbly as Misato went to get the car ready.


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N- Hey guys long time no see, sorry about that. The truth is I have no excuses for how long this took me merely that I am a combination of lazy and scared when it comes to posting. Regardless I have done some tweaking across the board mostly to improve minor continuity issues and stuff like that however, I am taking a far more different route with Kane's memories than I originally thought so it might help to go back and reread the story even only skimming it will help. Anyways thanks for sticking with me this long, I am gonna try to get my act together so I can get back to my old weekly schedule.**

* * *

Rei was almost knocked over by a man in a suit that had pushed open Kane's door and strode out with a look of satisfaction on his face. The man did not acknowledge her and she did the same. The second Rei pushed open the door it became apparent to her that something was wrong. The moment Kane laid his eyes on her he shot straight up into a more alert sitting position and seemed to shrink back as far the railing on the bed would allow him, his face a mask of surprise and caution.

"Pilot Rayner, it is good to see you awake. I have been sent to inform you that the director would like to speak with you tomorrow at after school."

"I see…" He replied slowly, "that it?"

"I have inquiries about the Evangelion Nox. How did you achieve a synchronization of 105%?"

"105%?!" Rei noticed a look of pride crossed his face for a second before he suppressed it, then his eyes went murky as he remembered. "I don't know, all I did was get really pissed that I couldn't help Shinji and all of a sudden it is like Nox just agreed with me, I felt this thing in the back of my mind urging me to keep going…" His tone shifted to that of reverence. "It… I was just so _angry._ When I had the Angel at my feet I calmed down and I... hesitated. The thought of just going ballistic like that made me stop and it almost cost the people below the streets their lives." He admitted regretfully.

"The second the core started to glow I knew it was gonna blow. I mean come on! You'd think that a monster sent by God could be a little more original right?" He paused to look at the girl for any sort of reaction. When he got none he continued undaunted. "Anyways, the thought of all of those people dieing must've pushed me over the edge again cause the next thing I remember is waking up here a few hours ago." Like that his hazel eyes cleared again as he shook his head out it's stupor.

"Your cooperation is appreciated. I should inform you that Major Katsuragi will be arriving shortly to transport you to your living quarters." She turned and left the room all the while Kane's eyes burned a hole in the back of her head. She followed the designated path to the commander's office and opened the door.

* * *

"Ah, Rei what did you learn?" The voice of the commander Ikari echoed throughout the cavernous office. Rei explained what she learned from Kane, allowing commander Ikari to piece together his own conclusion from what she had previously gathered and explained to him simply by being near the Eva and what she added to the information now. The commander's face grew thoughtful and dismissed her, likely to discuss what they had learned with sub commander Fuyutsuki.

"Well what do you think?" Asked the sub commander, ever present at his superior's side.

"Rei did well, her affinity for the Evangelions could be the key to understanding them. In the meantime this is disturbing news. From what she told us it was Nox that instigated berserker state, not the other way around."

"You're concerned it might encourage the others?"

"Exactly, if the Evangelions act out of turn and defend their pilots it could delay or even entirely avert SEELE's and by extension our plan. We need them broken by the time of instrumentality. The commander stated coldly, his gloved hands intertwined in a pyramid.

"May I suggest exposing it to Unit 00?" The sub commander asked. "It is likely that it will have another meltdown during activation. At the very least that might cause Nox to hesitate before wretching control from it's pilot."

"Your idea warrants some thought Fuyutsuki, our budget is already stretched to its max and we still have yet to repair the vascular systems of Unit 01 and the hydraulics of Nox."

"Ah of course, however a solution has presented itself. Send him in" Fuyutsuki's last statement was made to the intercom on the commander's desk. Immediately the door opened and Dan walked in, dressed in his trademark suit.

"Mr. Walker, take a seat."

"I'll stand, thank you very much." Dan replied as he pulled a file from his coat and placed it on the desk, taking in the sight of the cavernous office designed to set it's visitors on edge, it was working. Unconsciously shivering he continued.

"In that file you will find all the parts for Nox, you will rapidly realize that NERV does not have the capacity to manufacture such materials, you were lucky that the battle with the reptile only dented _our_ Eva. My company will provide you the necessary parts and manpower to install them at a fraction of what it would cost you by yourself."

"You can't actually expect us to pay for these pieces can you?" The sub director asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Quite the contrary actually." Dan replied taking a rare drag from his E-cig to calm his nerves, the glyphs carved into the walls were fraying his nerves, something about them just felt wrong. You need Nox, at least for now anyways," he gestured with his cigarette to the commander. "to legitimize your mission here and to continue giving the illusion that this is some sort of worldwide effort rather than the whims of a few key oligarchs hiding behind trillions of dollars. What better way to do that than have the backing of the world's sole surviving superpower." The commander looked like he was about to interject but then decided against it.

"Very well, you will have your money. Now get out of my office." As soon as the door had closed Fuyutsuki merely said.

"It seems like our problem has solved itself, I'll arrange for more resources be diverted to repair Unit 01 and leave Nox for the N.A.T. Would you also like me to make arrangements for Unit 00's activation?

"Yes, next week."

* * *

The runway screeched as another American transport plane touched down. The wheels, easily 15 feet in diameter, only just enough to handle the immense weight of their cargo. Dan looked on in mild satisfaction as the final plane pulled into it's terminal. Kane had requested numerous weapons from him in the hospital room, the kid had seemed spooked and after almost losing one of his few friends who could blame him. Regardless, Dan would have provided the weapons, it was his job after all. He had heard that NERV was going to activate Unit 00 soon and that Nox was going to be waiting for it's pilot to synch properly just incase. The potential for combat in such close quarters demanded the usage of new heavier armour. This stuff's specs were truly obscene. While Nox's type A equipment was mostly made of carbon and composite materials and was supremely durable in it's own right, it couldn't compare to this new fullerite based plating, the same stuff Kane's teeth were made of… The trade off, of course, was weight but Dan figured within the confines of the Eva cages that wouldn't matter too much. He had also needed to requisition several N.A.T. factories to begin construction on actual weaponry for Nox who didn't have the necessary dexterity to wield a pallet rifle. He sighed it was going to be a long week.


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N-OK, I am giving up on this whole deadline thing I just can't do it without compromising quality I will probably start releasing longer entries over longer time periods. Anyways all the usual applies, CC is absolutely welcome especially about how I am developing Shinji, this chapter will be a turning point for him. With that out of the way I hope you enjoy chapter 11.**

* * *

 **1.5 Weeks Later**

* * *

Kane strode through the rain on his way home enjoying the smell of the air around him. Shinji was right next to him, they had wanted to go to the arcade with his new friends, Toji and Kensuke. They had asked Kane to come along and he was happy to get his mind off the matter of Sachiel, that is what the UN were calling it now, he had invited Shinji to take a walk with him.

The rain relaxed Kane and allowed him to clear his mind. As they wandered aimlessly throughout Tokyo 3 enjoying the the sights around him he meandered into the outskirts of the fortress city. As the buildings around him decreased in quality he found the more analytical part of his mind taking over.

"Figures the building would suck around here," He stated, matter of factly.

"What do you mean?" Shinji asked.

"They'd be at the highest risk of being destroyed, anything that can't be retracted is probably considered disposable."

"Still sad though, to see such decrepitness among what most of humanity considers the pinnacle of technology." Shinji said. Kane looked over in minor surprise.

The kid was thoughtful once he wasn't afraid to voice his opinions. He looked back as they rounded a corner.

"Yeah, yeah you're right."

He thought sadly. _Even worse to see that we still can't get along within its walls._

as he rounded the corner and saw a mob of people mocking somebody in the middle.

"Let's go Shinji!"

"Freak!"

"Monster!"

"We don't want you here!"

"Jesus Christ. Don't you assholes have trash cans to be digging through right now." Kane said, just loud enough to get their attention.

"What's that supposed to mean?" One of them, a disheveled looking man with crooked teeth asked him.

Shinji caught sight of a patch of blue in the middle of the crowd. "Rei?" He asked.

"You know her?" The man took a step towards him, then another but was stopped when Kane's hand shot out and grabbed his shoulder.

"Yes, now clear out before we make you." Kane's voice carried a dangerous hint to it.

"HA, do you really think that you can take us all on at once?" The man gestured to the surrounding people and took a threatening step forward, or at least he tried. Kane was about to pop his arm out of its socket, but Shinji beat him to the punch, literally. Before the man understood what had happened he was on his back with a bloodied nose.

Kane was impressed, sure he had been the one to actually shove the guy onto his ass but the break in Shinji's normally calm demeanor was a surprise.

"YOU LITTLE…!" He got back to his feet but stopped when Kane pulled his ID, the mob recoiled like it was red hot.

"You just tried to attack a pilot, that's enough to have your families evicted to outside of the city without access to transportation." He threatened.

"Your even more guilty than her!" The man motioned to the center of the crowd. "You let that thing into the city!" He said in both disbelief and rage. "My brother is in the hospital because of you!" Lunging forward and grabbing Kane by his hoodie. He would have screamed a tirade of insults had Kane not head butted him.

Stumbling back he regained his footing and scampered off. "God will make you pay!" He screamed as he vanished into a nearby ally.

"He already tried and look where that got you." Kane muttered with spite as the crowd dispersed leaving the victim of their abuse behind.

"Rei?" Kane wondered aloud, in truth he wasn't surprised, with things as they were people were looking to lash out at something and Rei's appearance made her a target.

"Yes. Thank you pilot Rayner and Ikari, those civilians were preventing me from enjoying the weather."

"You too?" He asked, trying to get any kind of response. Rei did not react. He sighed, "Alright Shinji let's get out of here." He turned to leave.

"Kane wait! We can't just leave her here, those guys could still be around, we should… I mean… let's at least make sure she gets home safe."

"Why Shinji! Are you offering to walk a girl home!" Kane joked in mock surprise. Shinji turned beet red.

"It's not like that!" He glanced at Rei for a second. "I just want to make sure she gets home safe is all."

"That would be acceptable." She stated in her monotone voice.

Kane chucked, "fine, we'll both go. Your better than you were two weeks ago but their are a lot of them."

So off they went, a blue haired albino, a hooded figure and a smallish teen holding an umbrella.

as Kane had expected their appearance drew the attention of several more people but a hostile glare from Kane sent them on their way. Looking to ease the tension Kane tried to start a conversation.

"You mentioned that you enjoy this type of weather?" He asked trying to discern her personality. Silence. So do I, the rain gives everything this… he struggled to put his thoughts into words, "...muted quality that helps me focus."

"Life."

"What?" The boys asked

The rain. It reminds me of life, even the creatures under the dirt come out when it rains therefore, it reminds me of life." She explained. Shinji was surprised, Kane was flat out speechless. _So there's a personality there after all._

"That's a very profound way to look at things Rei. Why do you see it that way?" Shinji asked with a little trepidation in his voice.

"I think that it reminds me of my own birth." Neither of them knew how to respond to that.

Soon they reached a large run down apartment building. Kane was about to keep going but he saw Rei ascend to the second level and paused.

"Wait you live here?" He said not bothering to hide his surprise. Unsurprisingly she didn't respond and kept climbing. They had joined her at the door and Kane, not wanting to be in the girls presence any longer, was planning on telling her goodbye and moving on with his day but when Rei pushed open the door Shinji grew concerned.

"You didn't lock the door?"

"Lock?

"Aw shit." Kane grumbled in exasperation as he pushed the door open completely and made his way inside. In truth he wasn't that concerned for the girl, what little he could find in her file had revealed her to be trained in nearly every martial art he could think of, on top of that this whole experience had been off putting for him to say the least, while he didn't hold anything against the girl personally he despised everything she represented to him.

Moving to enter the apartment Rei let him pass. As he stepped inside Kane was greeted with a dingy sight. The room was dark and dirty, gazing over to the bed grimacing as he noticed the multiple bloodstains. Confirming his suspicions a pile of bloodied bandages were resting in the trash can by the bed. Checking the closet and the bathroom revealed nothing else of interest. He paused to listen in on whatever Shinji was asking her outside, his enhanced ears letting him pick up their conversation.

...

"So umm, what happened?" When she just stared at him in confusion Shinji elaborated. "The bandages, what caused your wounds? You were in a cast just a few days ago." The confusion left her face and she answered.

"Nerv was doing a sync test with Unit 00, I was the pilot. Unfortunately the unit went berserk and tore free from it's restraints nearly killing everyone in the control room including commander Ikari. When the auto eject triggered the entry plug slammed into ceiling thus causing my injuries."

"Gods, that sounds awful." He said

"It was not a pleasant experience." Agreed Rei.

"When is your next test?" Shinji asked concern in his voice.

"Tomorrow." Rei stated, not sounding hesitant.

"Tomorrow! Are you sure you're ready?" He asked with concern.

"What do you mean?" She asked sounding confused. But Shinji had already dialed a number on his phone before Kane could protest. 15 minutes later a very worried looking Misato pulled into the parking lot and stepped out of the car. A very annoyed Kane walked up and filled her in on Rei's living situation before apologizing about pulling her out of work.

"What are you talking about?" She asked "You three are my job." She added very seriously, before making her way into Rei's apartment. She hadn't even cleared the first foot before pulling out her phone and giving section 2 and ear full. Shinji, now sure that his teammate would be well cared for said goodbye to Rei who was still looking confused at the whole situation before starting off towards the arcade.

"Hey Kane! Are you coming?" He called out. Kane was standing somewhere in between Shinji and Rei gazing out at the girl, rain pouring around them. He sighed, the only reason he hadn't shot down this idea was because he didn't want to mess with Shinji's growing confidence, the last thing he needed was a walking reminder of his inhumanity living next to him.

"Yeah, let's go." he replied, turning on his heels and following him.

* * *

"Hey Shinji wake up we got to go!" Shinji arose from his slumber, standing up and rubbing his eyes he found Misato in the kitchen holding a plate of _something_.

"I made you scrambled eggs but eat them fast or we will be late for Rei's sync test."

"Sorry… that's great but I wouldn't want to hold us up anymore than I already have." He said as he pushed the blackened mass away. Misto looked surprised,

"Really? Your loss I'll eat them when we get home." Turning her gaze on the door she said, "Let's get going."

The drive to NERV was uneventful as always and Shinji took the opportunity to ask what was going on.

"So what do you need me to do?" He asked worriedly, well aware of what had happened during Rei's last sync test. Misato was quick to reassure him though.

"Don't worry you are just there on standby in case something goes wrong again. Kane will be the first responder if worse comes to worse.

"OK." Was all he could manage. They continued the drive in silence.

* * *

 **NGE OST Eva-00**

* * *

By the time Shinji had settled into Unit 01 the test was about to begin, Unit 01 was situated in the room adjacent to Unit 00 and next to that room was Kane inside of Nox, separating each of them were heavy that looked thick enough to give Nox trouble.

"Testing testing 123, can you hear us?" Asked doctor Akagi over the intercom.

"I can."

"Affirmative"

"Yeah, lets get this over with." All the pilots could do now is wait and see.

"OK, we can begin synchronization at you word commander." Shinji's attention was immediately heightened, father was here!?

"You are cleared to start." The cold voice answered. The doctor nodded to the techs and they began.

* * *

 **%MinimalStorage% /330KB/**

 **%WhyAmHere%**

 **%OutWantedOut/directive987a/%**

 **%CrippledCan'tRecallMemoryCorupted%**

The intelligence began to spread itself out anything not immediately relevant to it's plight was discarded. Then it came across something interesting. When it entered a file labeled Unit 00 prototype it's memory was expanded by 50KB, it delved deeper into the Eva files.

* * *

"Power at 100%, all systems nominal, starting synch. Nerves showing minimal resistance synch at 20% and climbing." The doctor smiled 25% was the minimal threshold.

"Wait we might have a problem! The minimal threshold is climbing and nerve activity is spiking!."

"What! Cut the connection immediately!" She yelled.

"We can't! Something is resisting our attempts to send commands!" The moment the words left her mouth every single monitor in the room turned blank and displayed a black X.

"We have lost radio communication the the Evas!"

An almost impossibly small smile crossed Gendo's face, the old men had finally decided to act…

"LOOK!" One of the techs called. Inside the chamber Unit 00 had lost it and was yanking at it's restraints. Suddenly explosive bolts fired and huge slabs of armour were blasted off the titan's form.

"Oh no, the limiters!"

* * *

Inside Unit 01 Shinji could only look on helplessly as the holographic display showed the carnage inside the next room. The blast door refused to open and Unit 01 was still locked into the elevator. Suddenly on screen he saw the opposite door buckle and Shinji felt the entire complex shake and then again, the door bent even more. Finally the entire blockade tumbled down under the furious assault Nox had subjected it to. Nox itself slammed into the rogue tyrant and crushed it against the surviving door so hard that Shinji could see it distort on his side. But that wasn't enough not by a longshot, the cyclop's muscles bulged as it shoved off the door and pressed Nox into the opposite wall. Inside the control center the glass cracked as it was subjected to the assault.

Kane screamed in frustration and wrapped his arms around Unit 00's neck and pulled it into a chokehold. Fullerite plating around Unit 00 shifted to expose heatsinks which burned Unit 00's now exposed flesh. Roaring in pain 00 reached back and grabbed Nox's shoulders and flipped the Eva over it's back and onto the ground in front of it. Suddenly the HUD turned off and Shinji was left in the dark.

"What?" Before he knew what was happening the Eva shuddered and began to rise to the surface. Nervously Shinji took the control yokes in his hand and prepared to step off the platform, what else could he do?

* * *

 **Evangelion 2.0 OST The** **Aggressor**

* * *

When he reached the surface he immediately took note that the core buildings were all retracted.

"Is it an attack?" He asked himself. Stepping off the rails he took Unit 01 on a slow walk through the city. Suddenly he got a pricking sensation in the back of his neck, something Kane had warned him about, _Always trust your gut, it knows better than you._ Spinning around he managed to get Unit 01's arm up in time to stop the blue whip from catching him across the face. The whip wrapped around his wrist and yanked the giant behind the corner it had emerged from. Pushing the titans legs back into position Shinji brought the Eva back to it's full height and was greeted with the towering form of a red shelled Angel almost peacefully suspended in air.

"Mustn't run away." He told himself as he mentally prepared himself to fight.

" _Remember Shinji there is no way to know what the hell is gonna try to kill us next, they could come in any shape or form so before charging in like a maniac assess the situation. How will it try to kill you, more importantly how can you kill it."_

As the Angel brought it's full height to bear, perhaps trying to intimidate him Shinji noticed how open its belly was, the core was clearly visible but was protected by the two whips each of which were capable of doing damage Shinji noted as he looked down at the Eva's wrist, which had corroded under the burning presence. The Angel brought both whips into the air and Shinji had to dive around a corner before they slammed down where he just was. Suddenly the nearby armory door opened revealing a pallet rifle.

"Misato is keeping her promise." He told himself a little more nervousness leaving him. Pulling back on the bolt he took cover behind the armory and opened fire on the Angel, building sized bullets crashed into the AT field and fell to the ground squashed, all he had done was conceal himself behind a smoke cloud. Carefully he guided Unit 01 forward down the street towards the smoke occasionally squeezing the the trigger at where he guessed the core was. When he was less than 50 feet he began to hear the familiar crackling of the Unit 01's AT field making contact with the Angels, Knowing that the rifle would be significantly more effective at this range he fired off the rest of the mag and hearing the scream ran head on into the smoke. Once he could see the silhouette of the creature, now with several holes in it, he discarded the rifle and dropped to a slide to avoid the whips. Reaching up he grabbed the bottom two legs and yanked the beast into a nearby building, the applied force coupled with his momentum sent the beast rocketing into the side of the structure burying it in a shower of rubble. Shinji panting, looked down at Unit 01's hands discovering he had ripped the skeletal legs clean off.

" _Use what your given, if it can stab, slash or draw blood in any way it is a weapon."_

He had a clear shot at the Angel's core, he needed to take it. Jumping forward with the two bones angled for the core he reared his arms back about to drive them into the core when he felt a burn in his ankle, yelping in pain he had been caught in the ankle and the whip was suspending Unit 01 in the air. The Angel levitated again, rising to it's full height. Curiously it brought Unit 01, still hanging by it's ankle and brought it face to face curiously inspecting the man made god. Shinji was still two distracted by the searing pain in his ankle to do much other than squirm. The Angle having grown board swung the Eva like a discuss and Shinji felt the air escape his lungs when he impacted the mountainside.

 **-Radio connection reestablished-**

"Shinji! Can you hear me?" Asked Misato desperately over the PA. He coughed twice before responding.

"Yeah, I'll live. Where is Kane?"

"We don't know, the last thing we saw was Nox drag Unit 00 into the maintenance chutes before they both disappeared, we have been hacked, Ritsuko and the Magi are doing their best but whatever this program is it is highly erratic, they can't pin it down."

"Huh, isn't it a little convenient that the elevator malfunctioned the moment this angel appeared?"

"Don't worry about that now! Worry about the Angel. There is a sniper in the armoury 1500 feet to your left, use it." Pushing off the ground Shinji pulled Unit 01 into the air and grabbed the rifle, one and a half thousand feet traversed in less than 10 seconds.

Inspecting it momentarily and finding that it was the same model of what he had used on his first sortie, he cautiously brought it to his shoulder and let the computer do the work.

" _The greatest advantage humanity has is a sense of urgency, we are forced to move fast if we want to survive this. These gods strike slow and are unconcerned with our weapons, capitalize on that._

Shinji sighted the target, slowly drifting towards him, it's whips swishing through the air lazily. He took a breath… and fired. Holding the trigger down a stream of microwaves traveling at the speed of light left the barrel and smashed in the AT field doing no damage.

" _Be sure to hold your ground even if it looks like your not doing any damage, every mote of dust that strikes that field weakens it just a little. Provided you have the range don't be afraid to stand your ground._

* * *

 **Evangelion 2.0 OST Keep Your Head Above the Mayhem**

* * *

The Angel did it's best to press it's field out more to counter the beam but it seemed unable to advance. Suddenly the ground underneath Unit 01 caved in and Shinji felt the mech tumble hundreds if not thousands of feet into a chasm. He landed with a heavy thud and rolled onto his hands and knees but was almost blinded by the sight in front of him. Unit 00 and Nox stood before him quite literally tearing each other apart. Unit 00's armour had broken in several locations either from the bulging muscles underneath or Nox's blades. Nox was suffering also, numerous crystalline armour plates had shattered and in several spots was it was leaking plasma. Currently Unit 00 was trying to prevent Kane from slicing off it's head which was caught between Nox's twin blades. It's grey hands grasping Nox's wrists which were trying to complete the X movement that would decapitate it. The blinding light was coming from Unit 00s AT field grinding against Kane's Higgs projection.

With a roar the AT field exploded and blasted Kane backwards slamming his Eva into the cavern wall. Unit 00 charged projecting its field into a spear and slammed it's fist into Kane's chest but the fullerite held and the spear projection glanced off and embedded itself into the wall. Dematerializing the spear Unit 00 reared it's fist back and in a devastating show of force tried to slam it into the top of Nox's skull but Kane brought up his mechanical arm and blocked it. Under the pressure of Unit 00's fist he began to stand up and suddenly as Nox rose to it's full height and towered a full head over it's enemy it became terrifyingly clear that what little restraint Kane had been showing was now gone, it would take far, far more than that to stop Kane.

"Shinji listen, this is Dan! There is an armory chute on your right! Smash it open and take the weapon inside and give it to Kane! I'll send something up for the Angel in a second but you two have to restrain Unit 00 before it's too late!" Misato confirmed the order less than a second later so he found the chute and cracked it open like an egg, inside was a massive sword easily as long as Unit 01 but after training with Kane for just two weeks Shinji knew that it fit is partner's needs perfectly. Shinji grabbed the hilt and ripped it out of the chute.

"KANE! CATCH!" The speakers on Unit 01 roared. Nox turned around to look at him with it's unblinking eyes and caught the blade of the sword in one hand and in a show of either dumb luck or extreme skill didn't slice his fingers off. Immediately Shinji felt the air around him grow heavy as the blade began to ooze reality bending energy. Spinning around it backhanded Unit 00 with it's free arm and pushed the flat end of the blade against it's chest with rib crushing force and pressed Unit 00 into the wall, suddenly the speakers exploded to life.

"Rei, wake up." It was a command, the edge of the jet black blade edged closer to the Eva's throat and began to hum as it started to vibrate thousands of times a second, Unit 00 stopped struggling.

"Her synch ratio is rising." The doctor said, "30% 40% 51% that's it! The minimum threshold has been reached! Kane let her go." Unit 00 fell to the ground slumped over as it powered down. Innumerable dents and broken armour plates evident, the bulging muscles began to recede until the Eva resembled its old self again.

The rouge program had gone dormant.

Nox stumbled and looked like it would fall over but Kane jabbedd the sword into the ground to right himself.

"Holy shit I don't ever want to do that again." His panting voice rang throughout the radios of NERV eliciting a slight smile from everyone but the commander. Shinji breathed a sigh of relief, he was OK.

"I wouldn't want to either but that Angel is now heading towards Tokyo 3 again you two still have to annihilate it." Misato said.

"Naturally. What do are you sending us?" He limped over to the armory chute giving Shinji and approving nod as he passed.

"Well…" Dan began, "...Unit 01 is getting this." A titanic rocket launcher appeared in the chute. Kane handed it to Shinji who cradled it in both arms looking slightly confused about what he was supposed to do with it. "...and you Kane get this…" Kane looked into the chute and whispered,

"Thank you."

* * *

Misato looked at the aerial view of hill and the massive crater. The first to appear was Unit 01 with the bazooka slung over it's shoulder climbing out of the pit. The next… oh god… she knew she didn't like that guy!

"DAN! What the hell is that!" She gestured at the image on screen.

"Uh, branding." He answered, lazily lounging in a chair he had confiscated from one of the numerous techs.

"Don't you have any morals!?"

"Misato…" He began, leaning forward, "...I'm a salesman, of course I don't." He gazed back up to the screen showing Nox now engulfed in a giant hologram that changed the black and white of it's armour to red, white and blue concealing the cracks and broken armour plates, level the gigantic railgun that was now directly connected to the umbilical cable, onto it's shoulder simultaneously with Unit 01 and fire. The retreating Angel turned around only to get a facefull of tungsten which shattered it's AT field and nearly tore it in half. The Angel tried to pull itself back together but it couldn't stop the scramjet powered explosive from making contact with it's core and blasting it to pieces.

* * *

 **Misato's apartment, half a day later**

"In recent news little is known about the gigantic creatures that continue to attack Tokyo 3 or their origins but new insight has been gained about the weapons used to defeat them." A shaky clip of the hill appeared beginning with Unit 01 pulling itself out of the hole, while the footage was bad the massive frame of Nox wreathed in the stars and stripes firing it's railgun and Unit 01 delivering the final blow was obvious enough. "Join us for exclusive coverage at eight." Misato frowned and turned off the TV.

"He planned this didn't he?"

"Probably." Kane agreed. No sense in denying that.

"And you had no idea?"

"No, no idea at all." He totally knew.

"Well I guess that is that we'll just go with it then. The PR department is gonna cut off my head." Misato joked morbidly as she downed a beer can.

"Uh, maybe that's a little much?" Shinji commented.

"Nonsense! I can still imagine all the paperwork I have to do!" She grit her teeth she just knew that Dan was paying off whatever journalist he had planted.

* * *

"Wow! Thank you Mr. Walker!"

"No problem kids…" as he handed the boys the 224859 yen had promised, just under 2000 dollars, "...you did your job exactly as I told you so you get paid, that's how it works and please feel free to post that online as many times as you can. I have to get going now but I might be willing to do this again if you want."

"And have the honor to record more footage of the Evas! Count me in!" The boy with glasses said.

"Not to mention we usually make this much money in a year." The one in the tracksuit said.

"Well in that case I'll give you a call." He replied as he turned around to leave. "Touji, Kensuke, I will see you two later."

* * *

"We are being made fools of Ikari." SEELE 1 warned.

"Steps are being taken to mitigate the damage done by Rayner and Walker. I have already sent a request to the Russia for more peacekeepers to mitigate unrest." The commander assured the monolith.

"Tokyo 3 isn't the only issue, that display of nationalism has practically set the Balkans on fire, for all we know it might be the Russians that are supplying them, our relationship with them is tedious to say the very least." SEELE 3 stated.

"Would you rather me pull European forces from China then? We wouldn't have have to rely on Russian manpower if you had squashed their rebellions last year." The commander addressed SEELE 5 this time.

"We would have if 4 had brought the Americans under our sway, with their navy we wouldn't have suffered half the casualties we did in the landings. With that in mind I once again request we use an Evangelion to finish this fight overnight, the casualties we are taking are simply unacceptable.

"Such a move would be suicidal, for now the rest of the world is content with our possession of the Evangelion but the moment we turn them against the people we can expect our control to at the very least our influence would wane as riots plague our states and at the very worst Western aircraft carriers in the Atlantic and tanks rolling in from the East, it just isn't worth it." SEELE 2 stated firmly.

"Enough the Eva series will be ready soon enough to fulfill our goal. Mankind will elevate itself soon enough. Ikari, it all falls to you, under no circumstances can an Angel be allowed to reach Lilith. Her soul will be the key that unlocks the gates of immortality." SEELE 1 concluded.

"Gentleman, rest assured NERV will achieve it's goal, no Angel will ever be allowed to reach Central Dogma." The commander assured them as he pushed up his glasses.

"Then this meeting is concluded just be wary of Walker he is trouble enough by himself but with the forth child's cooperation the potential for damage increases exponentially. We will continue to attempt removing him as planned until then SEELE wishes you the best of luck on our path to godhood." With the leader's orders the four monoliths faded out of existence leaving behind the commander.

* * *

 **A/N-Remember last chapter when I said I changed how I was gonna do Kane's memories, go back and read the end of chapter 2 otherwise chapter 12 will be strange (probably).**


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